Tag: obesity

Taxpayers Paid $6.2 Billion to Develop Weight-loss Drugs. Pharma Charges Consumers a Premium — Driving Up Healthcare Costs for Everyone

U.S. taxpayers picked up the tab for about $6.2 billion worth of research, development and distribution of GLP-1s, the new class of blockbuster weight-loss drugs, according to an investigation by The Lever.

The “blockbuster drugs” generate annual sales exceeding $1 billion for Big Pharma.

Drugs like Ozempic, Wegovy and Zepbound — which belong to the glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) class of drugs — are “minting billions of dollars” for Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk, the companies that make them.

Taxpayers fund the research. Pharma reaps massive profits. And Americans pay up to 11 times more for the drugs than people in other countries. The marked-up prices are inflating insurance premiums and risk bankrupting the country’s healthcare system, according to The Lever.

Researchers at Bentley University shared data with The Lever showing that between 1980 and 2024, the federal government spent $6.2 billion on the discovery and development of GLP-1 molecules, plus research on how to use those molecules to treat diabetes, obesity and other health conditions.

“You have to know a lot to develop a drug and to apply it in people,” Dr. Fred Ledley, professor of Natural and Applied Sciences at Bentley University in Waltham, Massachusetts, told The Lever. “What we call a ‘mature body of knowledge’ is not cheap.” Ledley provided the spending data to The Lever.

That research laid the foundation for the development of Ozempic and triggered a wave of similar drugs that spawned a massive market.

Keep reading

Ozempic Linked to 19 Adverse Health Events

By now, most people around the world have heard of Ozempic and Wegovy, which are GLP-1 receptor agonists. These drugs, originally made for treating Type 2 diabetes, cause rapid weight loss, thus attracting individuals who have been struggling to lose weight for a long time. In fact, the effectiveness of these drugs has led to a global shortage.1 However, as with many other drugs that promise immediate results, there’s a catch.

A report from The Epoch Times2 covered a study published in Nature Medicine,3 showing the impact of certain GLP-1 receptor agonists, sold under brand names such as Ozempic and Wegovy. As noted by The Epoch Times, “The media, patients, and even some doctors have dubbed the medications ‘miracle drugs’ because of their profound weight-loss effects.”4

In addition to weight loss, the study also noted that these drugs also lower the risk of “seizures and addiction to substances such as alcohol, cannabis, stimulants and opioids.”5 It’s believed that these drugs affect the brain’s neurological pathways related to reward and impulse control, explaining how these changes in behavior occur.6

Keep reading

Study: Majority of EBT-Eligible Food Products Are Ultra-Processed

We’ve all been there: you’re waiting in the checkout line at your local Save money. Live better™ Walmart, or wherever fine groceries are sold, and in front of you is a family of four — all obese if not morbidly so — with a cart chock full of Dr. Thunder (Walmart’s Dr. Pepper knock-off) and Hot Pockets and stuff like that.

“EBT,” they say when the cashier reports their bill.

Then you realize — with a disparate mix of revulsion, empathy, and helplessness — that you have just subsidized their slow-burning suicide and the homicide of their equally fat children.

One advocacy group recently attempted to quantify this phenomenon.

Via GoCoCo (emphasis added):

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has come under increasing scrutiny for how its benefits are spent. Critics point out that the program may be “encouraging families to eat highly processed, unhealthy junk food” rather than nourishing them with wholesome options. This concern prompted us to conduct a detailed investigation into the foods eligible for purchase with Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) cards (which deliver SNAP benefits) at one of the nation’s largest grocery retailers…

Our analysis of more than 13,000 SNAP-EBT eligible products reveals a stark nutritional reality. The vast majority of items that SNAP recipients can buy are highly processed. Notable findings include…

62% of EBT-eligible products studied are ultra-processed foods…

Nearly half (47%) of the products contain artificial flavorings…

8% of products contain additives that are banned in California or in California schools…

Over 160 products contain Red Dye No. 3, which has been recently banned by the FDA.

Of course, one of the biggest reasons this mass-scale human tragedy is allowed to play itself out is the influence of big food lobbyists in Washington (and at the state level) who bribe politicians and policymakers to include ultra-processed foods manufactured by mega-corporations like Nestle, Coca-Cola, et al. in the EBT program.

Often, these lobbyists go as low as weaponizing accusations of racism against anyone who objects.

Keep reading

Using The Marijuana Components THC-V And CBD Every Day Helps People Lose Weight, Study Finds

Research on the use of marijuana components to aid weight loss found that use of a combined product containing the cannabinoids THCV and CBD “was associated with statistically significant weight loss” as well as a slimmer waistline, lower blood pressure and decreased cholesterol.

The study, published late last month in the journal Cannabis, analyzed outcomes among 44 people who were administered either oral strips containing a mixture of the two cannabinoids or a placebo. Participants took one strip daily for 90 says and were evaluated for weight loss and certain metabolic markers.

“Use of the THCV/CBD strip was associated with statistically significant weight loss, decreases in abdominal girth, systolic blood pressure, and total and LDL cholesterol,” says the report, authored by Dr. Gregory Smith, the founder and CEO of plant-based medicine company NeX Therapeutics, based in Florida.

Participants—31 of whom were female and 13 of whom were male, with a combined average age of about 52 years—were given either a placebo or one of two different mucoadhesive oral strips. A lower-dose version contained 8 milligrams of THCV and 10 mg CBD, while a higher-dose version had 16 mg THCV and 20 mg CBD. Subjects received a reminder to take a dose each day on an empty stomach and report any side effects, and they agreed to refrain from using cannabis or other cannabinoid-based products.

Participants were not asked to make any changes to their diet or exercise routines.

Of 24 people who received the lower-potency oral strips, 16 (66.7 percent) demonstrated weight loss over the course of the 90-day period—on average losing 2.6 kilograms (5.7 pounds). Among the 10 who received the higher-dose strips, seven (70 percent) lost weight—an average of 4.1 kg (9.0 lbs).

The 10 subjects who received the placebo, meanwhile, lost an average of just 0.1 kg (0.2 lbs).

Nearly all (95.8 percent) in the lower-dose group also saw reductions in abdominal girth, as did 70 percent of the higher-dose subjects.

“It is interesting to note that there was a barely statistically significant decrease in the control/placebo group,” Smith wrote, “however, it is also worth noting that abdominal girth is probably the least accurate of all the biometric measures taken for the purposes of this study.”

The THCV/CBD groups also showed reductions in systolic blood pressure as well as total and LDL cholesterol, the research found.

“In summary, 90 day use of once-daily THCV and CBD-infused mucoadhesive strips was associated with clinically significant weight loss, decreases in abdominal girth, systolic blood pressure, and total and LDL cholesterol,” the report concludes, adding that stronger dosage appeared to perform better: “The 16mg/20mg daily dose in Group B was superior for weight loss compared to the 8mg/10mg daily dose in Group A.”

Keep reading

Urgent warning issued over fat jabs as 82 deaths in the UK linked to the use of weight-loss and diabetes drugs such as Ozempic and Mounjaro

More than 80 Britons have died after using weight-loss and diabetes jabs such as Ozempic and Mounjaro, it was reported last night.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency reported at least 22 fatalities linked to the medication up to the end of January.

A further 60 deaths were recorded for products aimed to help with Type 2 diabetes.

Nearly 400 people also required hospital treatment since the rollout of the products over the past few years.

The National Health Service currently warns patients to ‘never take an anti-obesity medicine if it has not been prescribed to you’.

And Dr Alison Cave, MHRA chief safety officer, added that professionals must advise on whether they are necessary.

She told The Sun: ‘The decision to start, continue or stop treatments should be made jointly by patients and their doctor, based on full consideration of benefits and risks.’

Figures from the MHRA show up to 18 deaths were linked to Mounjaro – the King Kong of jabs which was recently approved for use on the NHS.

Keep reading

San Francisco Health Department Hires Obese Woman to Promote Fatness — Report

The Health Department of San Francisco hired an obese woman named Virgie Tovar for the role of ‘weight stigma czar’ who’s job it will be to consult on ‘weight stigma and weight neutrality’, reports The Gateway Pundit.

Tovar, an influencer in the ‘fat positive’ movement is a self-described expert on ‘anti-weight-based discrimination’. She wrote the book ‘You Have the Right to Remain Fat’ which promotes obesity. She took to social media Tuesday to express her gratitude toward the new role.

“I’m UNBELIEVABLY proud to serve the city I’ve called home for almost 20 years in this way! This consultancy is an absolute dream come true, and it’s my biggest hope and belief that weight neutrality will be the future of public health,” Tovar said in a social media post Tuesday.

Keep reading

Study Links Ozempic To Blindness, Adding To Growing List Of Side Effects

Diabetes patients who took Ozempic were more than twice as likely to develop an eye condition that causes vision loss than patients using a different diabetes drug, according to a new study.

The study linked semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy — which in addition to treating diabetes are widely used to lose weight — to non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION).

The study, published last week on a preprint server, is undergoing peer review.

NAION can result in sudden vision loss due to loss of blood flow to the optic nerve. It is a major cause of severe vision loss and blindness in adults and the second-most common form of optic nerve damage after glaucoma. There is no effective treatment for the condition.

Doctors have recommended that patients considering taking these drugs should be informed of the risk, Bloomberg reported.

While the absolute risk of the disorder remains low, the authors of the study said, they found 1.4 additional cases per 10,000 among patients who took Ozempic.

Researchers analyzed data from the national healthcare registries in Denmark and Norway, comparing the rates of NAION between people taking semaglutide (Ozempic) versus those taking SGLT-2s, an older class of drugs used to treat Type 2 diabetes.

Keep reading

Weight-loss Drug Prescriptions for Kids and Teens Soar Despite No Safety Data

The number of weight-loss drug prescriptions provided by pediatric and adolescent medical specialists for children and teens increased sevenfold between October 2022 and September 2024, according to a MedPage Today analysis of Symphony, a prescription drug database.

Prescriptions for Novo Nordisk’s drugs liraglutide, the generic name for Saxenda, and semaglutide, the generic name for Wegovy and Ozempic, rose from 3,448 to 24,435 in the U.S. during that time.

Total prescriptions for all GLP-1 receptor agonist drugs — the broader class of drugs they are part of — prescribed by pediatric and adolescent medicine specialists, more than doubled during the same period, from 59,868 to 125,538.

However, those numbers do not even include GLP-1 drugs prescribed to children by primary care physicians or family medicine practitioners, or at compounding pharmacies, MedPage Today said.

Since the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Wegovy in 2021, the drug — and the entire class of drugs — has become a sensation, promoted by influencers and celebrities, helping to fuel a massive new drug market estimated to be worth $100 billion a year for drugmakers.

About 20% of U.S. children and adolescents are chronically obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The FDA approved Saxenda to treat obesity in kids 12 and up in December 2020 and Wegovy in December 2022.

Keep reading

Harvard Study: Half of Adult Americans Eligible for Ozempic-Like Drugs

Glucagon-like peptide receptor agonists (GLP-1 RA) are the current financial rainmakers for BIG PHARMA.

Shi et al from Harvard reported recently in JAMA Cardiology.

Rapidly increasing uptake of semaglutide made it the top-selling drug in the US in 2023, with net sales of $13.8 billion. Quantifying the number of US adults eligible for semaglutide may guide future policies for this high-cost therapy and clarify potential implications for pharmaceutical spending.

The authors conclude that approximately 137 million adults or half the of the US population could have a clinical indication for once weekly GLP-1 RA drugs. This budget breaking conclusion no doubt will have to be addressed by the incoming HHS administration led by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Keep reading

If Common Chemicals Harm Frogs and Rats, What Are They Doing to Your Children?

The TED Talk below features Penelope Jagessar Chaffer, director of the documentary film “Toxic Baby,” and Tyrone Hayes, Ph.D., a professor of integrative biology at the University of California, who has dedicated most of his career to studying the health effects of the herbicide atrazine.

According to Chaffer, the average American woman today has 30,000 to 50,000 chemicals in her body that her grandparents did not have. Many of these chemicals have been linked to the rapidly rising incidence of chronic childhood diseases.

In her talk, Chaffer cites the following statistics, which are likely higher today, since this talk was given in 2010:

  • In the United Kingdom (U.K.), the incidence of childhood leukemia rose by 20% in one generation.
  • In Canada, the prevalence of asthma increased by 400% in 20 years; 1 in 10 children is now diagnosed with asthma.
  • In the U.S., childhood cancers have seen a similar rise as that of childhood leukemia in the U.K. Autism spectrum disorder has also increased by 600% in the past 20 years; the incidence of autism rose by 57% between 2002 and 2006 alone.
  • In the Netherlands, Rotterdam has seen a 400% increase in genital birth defects.

Obesity and juvenile diabetes have also skyrocketed, and while a high-sugar diet likely bears the brunt of the blame, there’s every reason to suspect that endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) — many of which enter our system via processed foods — add to the metabolic dysfunction we now see.

Keep reading