Ozempic and Wegovy: Lose Weight Fast!
Also: be prepared to take the drugs for the rest of your life if you don’t want to regain the weight you lost
Who has not heard of the many celebrities who’ve lost weight fast taking semaglutide — aka Ozempic or Wegovy? From Chelsea Handler to Elon Musk, celebrities have taken the drugs to lose weight or “combat aging.”
Some writers on the Medium service have written good reports of their experiences with these weight loss drugs.
I have good news and bad news about Ozempic and Wegovy.
First, the good news: they work. These medications do help people to lose weight and they also help people to manage diabetes. I consulted with a pair of amazing doctors last year who were putting together a telemedicine program for people with obesity which included prescriptions for Wegovy. The program also included diets created by one of the world’s experts in integrative medicine. Their program might help the patients who could afford it, because the doctors knew that for weight loss, these drugs need to be taken permanently. I say “could afford it” because the concierge medicine concept started at $2,500 a month and went up from there, not inclusive of prescribed Wegovy.
Since I’ve been using Zoe Nutrition, I haven’t paid much attention to the weight loss drug scene. First, I choose to avoid prescription medication except in extreme situations (and my metrics support that decision). Second, as I learn more about my own microbiome and body, it’s become increasingly clear that there is no pharmaceutical intervention that can replace actual microbiome healing.
My MD partner clients understood this as well. Their plan was to jumpstart weight loss and transition patients to healthy, weight-maintaining diets and adequate physical activity over time.
Wegovy and Ozempic Prices Are Outrageous — And Lifelong
“What if you could invent a pill to cure obesity?” Pharmas have been chasing that grail for decades and they finally came up with semiglutide. Like every other intervention in the industry, the general concept is “improve a huge health problem” and “be sure the drug must be taken continuously throughout the patient’s lifetime.”
Pharma’s business value proposition to the public is always balanced with their value proposition to their corporation and shareholders: inexpensive drugs that only need to be taken for a short time, much less drugs that offer a geniune cure for illness, are never desirable. Drugs that need to be taken to maintain health status for a lifetime? Especially ones that develop dependency, requiring ever-higher doses to produce the same effect?
Let’s GOOOOOOOOOOO!
The average retail price for Wegovy is over $1,700 right now. Ozempic goes for $1,029. There are coupons on offer for Mounjaro (tirzepatide), a related medication for Type 2 diabetes, which is fortunate since it’s retailing for $1,179.85.
So, let’s talk about the economics of this situation. And let’s talk about our bodies as we age, and things that put mileage on us that no one desires.
If you can afford to spend over $20,000 a year for Wegovy or $12,000 a year for Ozempic, you can take these drugs, lose an average of 15% of your body weight, and keep the weight off. It will stay off too: as long as you keep taking the drugs.
Whether people are using the drugs for cosmetic weight loss — like Chelsea Handler — or using them as they were designed: to improve Type 2 diabetes and treat people clinically diagnosed with obesity, these metabolism-altering drugs still need to be taken regularly and continuously for weight loss results and improved metabolic function.
If a Type 2 diabetic stops taking Ozempic, their condition will deteriorate.
If an obese person stops taking Wegovy, they will regain the weight they lost.
Chances are, they will gain more weight than they did before they started taking these medications.
Alternatives to Ozempic, Wegovy, and Similar Drugs
Many people who take Ozempic, Wegovy, or other similar drugs which are classified as GLP-1 agonists experience common side effects, including nausea, headache, diarrhea, stomach pain, and other symptoms of digestive discomfort. There are more serious side effects noted, including pancreatitis, hypoglycemia (low blood sugar), kidney damage, and gallbladder disease. Some people who have taken Ozempic have developed thyroid cancer.
The most serious consideration for anyone taking any of the GLP-1 agonists should be the fact that: if you stop taking them, you will not only no longer lose weight, you will regain all the weight you lost. Due to the well-documented way our bodies respond to rapid weight loss, chances are, you will also gain even more weight, and end up weighing more and being more ill than when you started.
The sad truth is, especially as we grow older, our bodies cannot cope with a lifetime of obesogenic foods: the primary foods that comprise the Standard American Diet (SAD). While drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic help people to lose weight while eating obesogenic foods, the “rebound effect” after individuals stop using them is likely to be as severe, or even more severe, than the responses of most people who have completed extreme short-term weight loss programs like television’s “The Biggest Loser.”
One of the primary alternatives to these drugs are microbiome-healing approaches like Zoe Nutrition.
You do not have to pay for tests and an organized program like Zoe Nutrition, although I have been and continue to be successfully using the program to strengthen my microbiome. As I’ve written before, not only have I achieved my weight loss goals and maintained a healthy weight, I also have experienced a lot of improvement with a chronic health condition that I have experienced for nearly my entire life: Irritable Bowel Syndrome.
I can and do eat regular, nutritious meals and I do not count calories. I am more active than the average woman of my age, and I also enjoy high energy levels and good moods.
Before I started the Zoe Nutrition program, I had already eliminated obesogenic foods from my diet, but now that I’ve been participating in the program for a while, I realize that my diet was far too limited, which did not help my overall health or my microbiome’s diversity.
The old advice of “eat mostly plants, not too much,” is proving to be very beneficial for me.
The biggest benefit of eating a genuinely nutritious diet of non-obesogenic foods is a lack of hunger and a normal, regulated appetite. When I feel hunger now, I know it’s real. I know I should eat a nutritious meal, and I have the ingredients I need to prepare one.
From what I have heard so far, medications like Wegovy and Ozempic may provide “weight loss results,” much like diet pills of the past — does anyone remember the phen-phen craze? But without lifestyle changes and being willing to forego the obesogenic “treats” that are omnipresent in our stores, fast food, fast-casual, and even many sit-down restaurants, their results will be short-term — and very costly.
Sources:
Aubrey, Allison, “Wegovy works. But here’s what happens when you can’t afford to keep taking the drug,” Shots: Health News From NPR, 30 January 2023, url: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/01/30/1152039799/ozempic-wegovy-weight-loss-drugs
Brewer, Alex, PharmD, “All About Wegovy,” Healthline.com, 17 February 2023, url: https://www.healthline.com/health/drugs/wegovy
Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. “Obesity Prevention Source: Toxic Food Environment,” url: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/obesity-prevention-source/obesity-causes/food-environment-and-obesity/
Rosen, Jamie. “What is Ozempic Face?” Town & Country, 29 November 2022, url: www.townandcountrymag.com
Nguyen, Victor, PharmD., “Ozempic (semaglutide),” Medical News Today, 16 February 2023, url: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/326252