Ozempic Propaganda Roundup: Unpacking the corrupt motives and means behind hefty pharmaceutical propaganda.
More devastating stats on Ozempic weight loss treadmill
Related: Nestle Debuts ‘Brand to Support GLP-1 Users’ (Ozempic Patients)
Via NPR (emphasis added):
“More and more people who started taking the new GLP-1 agonist drugs are now confronting the realities of their limitations; medications like Wegovy and Mounjaro tend to help with sustained weight loss only while people are on them. But because of cost, for example, negative side effects, or supply shortages, many people are having to transition off of them — while trying not to regain the weight…
[Jonathan Meyers] isn’t confident he could keep those distracting thoughts at bay in the long run, without pharmacological support.
And so far, clinical data seem to back up Meyers’ suspicions. One early study showed patients regained two-thirds of the weight lost within the first year of stopping. New analysis showed 17% of people able to maintain 80% of their weight loss after stopping. And while experts say lifestyle choices like food and activity must be the cornerstone of all lasting weight loss plans, they also recognize those changes alone are often not enough for patients with obesity.
In other words: Chronic disease requires chronic treatment, no different than kidney disease, or high cholesterol. The new obesity treatments act on the various hormonal and metabolic drivers of obesity.”
Note the framing of the NPR headline linked above, pre-apologetic for any offense it might cause to the pharmaceutical industry: “The new obesity drugs work, but it’s a dilemma when people have to stop taking them.”
Don’t want to lose those corporate advertising bucks, huh, “public radio”?
They’ve been running with this “obesity is a disease like cancer or renal failure” narrative for a while now to justify the medicalization of a problem that can, barring genetic complications, be entirely treated with lifestyle changes but in so doing would not pad the pharmaceutical industry’s bottom line.
Related: Obesity Is a ‘Brain Disease,’ Claims ‘Expert’
The Atlantic fellates The Science™, celebrates ‘miracle’ Ozempic
Leading Deep State propaganda outlet, The Atlantic, recently took a break from its usual warmongering and apologia for the criminal national security state to push pharma talking points on its readers for some reason that probably has something to do with a sponsorship deal, either explicit or implied via advertising.
Via The Atlantic (emphasis added):
“There’s no such thing as a miracle cure for obesity, but the latest weight-loss drugs seem to come pretty close. People who take Ozempic or other weekly shots belonging to a class known as GLP-1 agonists, after the gut hormone they mimic, can lose a fifth or more of their body weight in a year. Incessant “food noise” fueling the urge to eat suddenly goes silent.
In recent months, the mystique of these drugs has only grown. Both semaglutide (sold under the brand names Ozempic and Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Mounjaro and Zepbound) were initially developed for diabetes and then repurposed for weight loss. But they apparently can do so much more than that. Studies showing the heart benefits of semaglutide have already led the FDA to approve Wegovy as a way to reduce the risk of major cardiac events, including stroke, heart attack, and death, in certain patients. The drug has also shown clear benefits for sleep apnea, kidney disease, liver disease—and can potentially help with fertility issues, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, colorectal cancer, alcohol overuse, and even nail-biting*. These days, a new use for GLP-1s seems to emerge every week.
With each new breakthrough, GLP-1s look more and more like the Swiss Army knife of medications.”
*This is one of those [citation needed] moments. Those are monster claims — treating colorectal cancer? — that require compelling evidence.
Continuing:
“GLP-1s improve health outcomes through three mechanisms, Daniel Drucker, a professor of medicine at the University of Toronto who co-discovered GLP-1 in the 1980s, told me. (Both Drucker and Seeley have consulted with GLP-1 manufacturers, as have many prominent obesity researchers.) The first mechanism involves the main functions of the drug: controlling blood sugar and inducing weight loss…
A second mechanism that could explain some of these health effects is that the drugs act directly on certain organs…
GLP-1s likely spur wide-ranging effects across the body through a third, more generalized process: reducing inflammation.”
Two out of the three mechanisms by which GLP-1 is alleged to improve health — controlling blood sugar and reducing inflammation — is easily achieved through diet and other natural means. The third — tapping GLP-1 receptor sites — is likely a game of diminishing returns, as receptors will become desensitized over time to the constant pinging and may cease working altogether, potentially causing catastrophic health outcomes down the line, but likely far after the industry has made out like a bandit and moved on to the next hustle.
Ben Bartee, author of Broken English Teacher: Notes From Exile, is an independent Bangkok-based American journalist with opposable thumbs.
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