The arsenal of weight-loss drugs has proven successful in eliminating unwanted kilos quickly and easily. Photo / 123rf
The arsenal of weight-loss drugs has proven successful in eliminating unwanted kilos quickly and easily. Photo / 123rf
Ever since college, Brad Jobling struggled with his weight, fluctuating between a low of 52 kilograms when he was in his 30s to almost 100kg. He spent a decade tracking calories on WeightWatchers, but the weight he dropped always crept back onto his 1.65-metre frame.
A little over a year ago, the 58-year-old Manhattan resident went on a new weight-loss drug called Wegovy. He’s lost more than 13kg and has started eating healthier food and exercising – the habits behind many commercial diet plans and decades of conventional wisdom on sustainable weight loss.
Yet Jobling’s experience has altered his perspective on dieting. He now sees obesity as a disease that requires medical intervention, not just behavioural changes. He thinks he will need to stay on a drug like Wegovy for the rest of his life, even though it has taken some of the joy out of eating.
Jobling sees obesity as a disease that requires medical intervention, not just behavioural changes. Photo / 123rf
“I don’t see how you can maintain [the weight] without medication,” Jobling said. “Obviously, it’s all about self-control. But I think it’s less of a struggle to really maintain healthy eating when you’ve got that assistance.”
Recent injected drugs like Wegovy and its predecessor, the diabetes medication Ozempic, are reshaping the United States health and fitness industries, just as they’re changing the lives of those taking them. The drugs have proven successful in eliminating unwanted weight more quickly and easily than simply consuming fewer calories and burning more. Such is their disruptive power that even established diet companies such as WeightWatchers and brands such as Lean Cuisine are getting makeovers.
Although celebrities including Oprah Winfrey have spoken publicly of the drugs as revolutionary, some health experts worry that businesses without any expertise will start dispensing the prescription medications along with bad advice and unproven therapies.
A demand too big to ignore
At least three million prescriptions for the class of medications known as GLP-1 agonists were issued each month in the US in the year to the end of March, according to data from health technology company IQVIA. They include semaglutide, the drug in Ozempic and Wegovy, and tirzepatide, the drug in Mounjaro and Zepbound. Morgan Stanley research analysts have estimated that 24m people, or 7 per cent of the US population, will be using GLPT-1 drugs by 2035.
The world’s leading diet programmes have taken note of such statistics and incorporated the drugs into their existing subscription plans.
WeightWatchers, founded in 1963, acquired telehealth provider Sequence last year, enabling members to get prescriptions for weight-loss drugs. WeightWatchers is sticking with its focus on behaviour change as the cornerstone of weight reduction but launched virtual clinics that provide customised exercise and nutrition plans, as well as prescription care, for people who want to lose 20 per cent of their body weight on average.
The world’s leading diet programmes have incorporated popular weight-loss drugs into their existing subscription plans. Photo / 123rf
“The weight-loss space will be led by the acknowledgment that weight loss is a matter of healthcare,” WeightWatchers chief executive Sima Sistani told analysts earlier this year. “This is a paradigm shift because weight loss has been and, unfortunately, often still is viewed as a vanity issue.”
The Mayo Clinic, which first offered a weight management plan in book form in 1949, has published an updated version of its longtime bestseller, titled The Mayo Clinic Diet: Weight-Loss Medications Edition.
The Mayo Clinic Diet programme has expanded to include access to weight-loss drugs and advice on managing any side-effects, according to Digital Wellness chief executive Scott Penn, whose company developed an online platform for the original programme.
The new drugs had made being very overweight “feel more medical as a condition”, he said.
Gyms and diet food companies look to muscle in
Luxury athletic club operator Life Time launched a membership scheme last year that offers comprehensive medical testing, personalised training and a host of alternative therapies such as cryotherapy. Members of the Miora programme can get Ozempic and other weight-loss drugs through the medical staff of a clinic that opened in Minneapolis last year.
Jeff Zwiefel, executive director of Life Time Miora, called the new drugs a “game changer” for the fitness industry.
“We have an opportunity and an obligation and a responsibility to help people achieve results in conjunction with medical providers and make sure that that’s the way to go,” he said.
Fitness chains are banking on the idea that people on the drugs will lose enough weight to overcome any self-consciousness or physical limits that keep them from exercising. The gym franchise Equinox started a new personal training programme in January for prescription-holders who want to preserve or build muscle mass as they shed unwanted weight.
The world of drug-assisted weight loss is altering the ambitions of food companies. Sales of SlimFast, a line of meal-replacement shakes and snacks sold at supermarkets, had dropped as people turned to weight-loss drugs and retailers cut shelf space for diet products, the brand’s parent company, Glanbia, told investors in February.
Since the drugs suppress appetite, Glanbia and other companies are marketing their products as a source of adequate nutrients for people taking GLP-1s. Swiss multinational Nestle thinks it can benefit from the drugs’ popularity and is expanding its Lean Cuisine frozen meals and Optifast protein shakes.
“Diets are cool again,” Nestle chief executive Ulf Mark Schneider told analysts in February. “It’s something that people used to do quietly on the side, uncertain about their outcomes.”
A third of people lose 5 per cent or more of their body weight with diet and exercise alone. Photo / 123rf
Promising results and wealth of unknowns
Research has shown that about a third of people lose 5 per cent or more of their body weight with diet and exercise alone, according to Dr Louis Aronne, director of the Comprehensive Weight Control Centre at Weill Cornell Medical School. In comparison, the medicine in the diabetes drug Mounjaro helped people with obesity or who were overweight lose at least a quarter of their weight when combined with restricted calories and exercise, a new study showed.
However, some experts worry about businesses marketing the drugs or serving as fitness coaches for patients on the medications. Dr Cian Wade, a healthcare consultant for the global strategy and management firm Kearney, said he was concerned about a proliferation of clinics that lacked experience with obesity and related health conditions.
“There’s a potential worry that, for some patients, [the clinics] will not have the right expertise at hand to be able to appropriately manage the side-effects, nutrition-related issues,” he said.
Since GLP-1 medications are so new, it’s unclear how many patients will stick with their drug regimens, which produce intolerable side-effects for some. Another reason patients may drop the drugs is cost. A month’s supply of Wegovy costs US$1300 (NZ$2180) and Zepbound is priced at US$1000 (NZ$1677).
Lisa Donahey, 54, an actress and singer who lives in Los Angeles, started Mounjaro under a doctor’s care a year ago to address her Type 2 diabetes. At the time, Donahey, who is 1.7m tall, weighed 118kg and was a veteran of diet plans such as Jenny Craig, WeightWatchers and Nutrisystem.
Her weight has since dropped to a little less than 86kg. She goes to a gym. After always being cast as a character actor, she’s looking for new roles. Having used Mounjaro to give her “a kick-start,” she plans to wean herself off it once she loses another 18kg.
“I had a sense of hopelessness that I was destined to be this way and just could not do it by myself,” she said. “Now, with my weight being managed and the new version of ‘me’ is emerging, I just feel so empowered, excited and hopeful.”
