August 1, 2024 — On the theme of “Is there anything GLP-1s can’t do?” a new randomized controlled trial is coming at us from the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference. It showed promising signs that a GLP-1, liraglutide, might slow the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Liraglutide is used under the brand name Victoza to treat type 2 diabetes. At higher […]
July 31, 2024 — A fascinating new study in Annals of Internal Medicine asks an important question. When people receive semaglutide for type 2 diabetes, are they less likely to smoke? This is not such a random question. In fact, clinicians are reporting striking reductions in addictive behaviors by people receiving it for obesity. So William Wang and colleagues […]
July 22, 2024 — A gray market for obesity medicines is thriving. The quality of the products in this market range from reasonable to sketchy to utterly unreliable. But millions of people are taking a chance on them. Big pharma companies innovated to bring fully vetted formulations of important medicines to market, spending billions of dollars to do it. […]
July 15, 2024 — What should we take away from yet another suggestion that semaglutide might cut the risk of dementia? An Unexpected Finding This latest hint was a surprise. It comes from research that aimed to measure the risk of neurological and psychiatric problems associated with taking semaglutide for type 2 diabetes. Riccardo De Giorgi and colleagues were […]
July 10, 2024 — The headline is compelling. “Zepbound outperforms Ozempic and Wegovy in head-to-head weight loss study.” It certainly confirms the bias of a lot of people in the field. But is it true? Did tirzepatide (Zepbound) really beat semaglutide (Wegovy) in a head-to-head comparative study for obesity? In a word, no. Uncontrolled, Observational, and Inequivalent Dosing The […]
June 25, 2024 — It’s over. The 84th Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association came to an end yesterday and for anyone interested in obesity, it has given us a lot to absorb. After four days with a steady stream of new information about drugs like the GLP-1 agonists that regulate appetite and adiposity, we are left wondering. […]
June 20, 2024 — It’s quite weird, actually, watching the contortions of health plans as they twist to resist the rising tide of obesity medicines. Because despite the twisting and contortions, obesity medicines are as difficult to resist as a rising tide. Those who pretend it is not happening find themselves under water. A new survey from the International […]
June 4, 2024 — New research at the annual Endocrine Society meeting in Boston suggests that semaglutide treatment may work in part through enhancement of taste sensitivity in persons with obesity – especially sensitivity to the sweetness of foods. Mojca Jensterle Sever presented the results. She explained: “Some studies have reported that individuals living with obesity often perceive tastes […]
June 1, 2024 — This is a problem of human mistakes. Compounding pharmacies are exploiting the failure of pharmaceutical companies to meet the scale of need for effective obesity medicines. So people with a serious medical need for these medicines face a hideous choice. Suffer without them or take a chance on dodgy compounded products. The fact that this […]
May 30, 2024 — In a world that systematically denies people access to obesity medicines, the rush of reports that people frequently stop taking them makes us wonder. How does this qualify as news? Why do reporters repeatedly paint a misleading picture of non-compliant patients? Yet, health reporters keep offering up this narrative. The latest prompt for this is […]
