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‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

nature.com

611–620 of 1001 posts

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#611
post #414

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I would rather die young than deal with those side effects. And those of us who are competitive endurance athletes need the oxidative stress; it's not necessarily a bad thing depending on timing and volume. Plus we will probably find other harmful side effects after long term use. There is no free lunch when you mess around with basic metabolism; everything has a price (not just in money).

You would rather die than suffer through three months of occasional strong nausea, constipation and brainfog? I hope that's hyperbole or that you have someone to talk to.

It sounded like it was decades of side effects, rather than 3 months. Presumably that affects the calculus

Especially since we're talking about possibly dying a couple years early vs definite awful side effects

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#612

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I mean, if you have perfect bloodwork and a marvel movie body probably not necessary but otherwise yes. Heart disease, hypertension, high cholesterol, colon cancer rates are rising amongst everyone, even thin people. These drugs positively impact indicators of these things in everyone. Longevity makers have been betting on metformin for a long time and these drugs are like a supercharged metformin

A marvel movie body is made through injecting steorids.. not living healthily.

Natural bodybuilding is a thing. It does require eating a ton of protein though, so whether or not it's "living healthily" depends on what you consider a normal amount of poultry and fish a person should be eating on a daily basis.

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#613

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Yes, your instinct is correct, you have vastly oversimplified it in an unhelpful way. The body is not an energy equation to be balanced. The desire to eat is driven by our hormones and these are not easily overridden by willpower. In fact, study after study shows that willpower is insufficient for most people. Hunger is produced by a complex set of factors that we do not fully understand. What we eat and how we live…

The body is an energy equation to be balanced. Physics defines that. What you are talking about substantially in your post is about willpower with regards to eating and exercise which is totally different.

in a banal sense this is true but the reality is less clear than the CICO folks would have you think. there are regulatory functions in the method for energy consumption (basal metabolic rate is not constant) and microbiota have a substantial effect both through their own metabolism and endocrine effects

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#614
post #584

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I'm also on one of these drugs (Tirzepatide) and have been for a few months. The first time I remember knowing I was fat was when a babysitter made fun of me for it at age 6. I've been fat ever since and I'm in my late 30s now. I've lost significant amounts of weight (60+ pounds) three times in my adult life, through simple calorie restriction (intermittent fasting, including before I'd ever heard the term). Every ti…

What finally got me on right way on controlling hunger was just getting used to eating once a day and dropping a lot of the quick-burning foods that made me go hungry quicker. Not necessarily going super healthy but stuff like eating less bread/pasta and more say baked potatoes so still nice tasty food that doesn't get me into diet sadness mood, just shifting away from carbs Also figuring out when I'm "brain hungry"…

Yeah, I've never struggled with weight the way other comments in this thread have, but I made similar changes when I was younger and they've been one of the best things I've done. I have one largish meal a day, with one smaller or a snack, and focus on low GI foods but in a mild way. When I get that "brain is bored" style hunger I go for tea with a squirt of water enhancer in it lately.

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#615

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I don't know if I'd call a veterinary anaesthetist a foremost expert on fat metabolism. His thoughts on insulin signaling are not consistent with the consensus among obesity researchers. He thinks glp-1 works through uncoupling or fat browning which is just not true. The consensus among most obesity researchers is the cause of obesity is primarily neurological, not metabolic. Basically the brain can't properly regula…

Is human metabolism really so different from other mammalian metabolism?

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Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#616
post #608

Petro Dobromylskyj is one of the foremost experts of fat metabolism. He has a blog called Hyperlipid where he's been blogging about fat metabolism and interpreting research for close to 10 years. He thinks the GLP-1 inhibitor drugs will be a disaster in the long term because they 1) cause weight loss but also 2) cause the body to create lots of new adipocyte (fat cells). Increasing the number of adipocytes is very un…

>As long as you are taking the GLP-1 inhibitor drugs you will lose or maintain weight, but as soon as you stop you will gain a lot of weight back. Sounds like the opposite of a disaster for pharmaceutical companies. Well, on the upside, the demand for this is so great that cheap generics shouldn't be too far away, right? And it seems like an insurance no-brainer to cover it for life, right?

The cheap generics never appear till the last of the patents have expired regardless of demand.

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#617
post #79

> I believe that everyone, even the skinny folks, should be on GLP1 drugs for the longevity effects. Are you for real? Serious question.

I had the same reaction. I minimize oxidative stress on my body by being selective about what I eat: having a bit less of some delicious things and eating a bit more of some boring foods that I know are good for me. Also, fuck 'longevity.' The population of the world has doubled during my lifetime and this is a Bad Thing which is wiping out vast numbers of other species. Call me misanthropic if you like but humans ar…

Man, I'm really sick of this outlook. There's a whole solar system here full of unlimited space and resources. A hundred years from now, if someone feels like it they'll be able to live in an O'Neill cylinder the size of San Francisco by themselves, and it won't be any weirder than /r/vandwellers today

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#618

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The implication is that something has happened during the last 50-100 years that caused people's "natural weight" to change upward. (Someone's "natural weight" is normally called their "set point".) The evidence is a little slim (no pun), but there's one theory which I find quite compelling. The theory is that eating foods with high flavor-calorie association increases your set point, and eating foods with low flavor…

Haven't heard anyone talk about the Shangri-La diet in ages. I did a slight variation of this for awhile way back in my 30s at it worked great. Recently testing this out with OMAD but haven't been doing it long enough to see if it is workable. I'm in my 50s now and a lot of things that worked wonders in my 30s do not work as well as they once did.

I'm going to try this because I recently fell off the OMAD wagon, and it usually takes me 3 solid days of white-knuckling it to get back to it feeling natural without wanting to eat during the day. Wondering if some plain celery or olive oil can ease the transition.

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#619

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With every weight loss intervention when you stop you gain back the weight. GLP-1 agonists don't seem to be any different than another other intervention.

> With every weight loss intervention when you stop you gain back the weight. GLP-1 agonists don't seem to be any different than another other intervention. Except for one thing: it's fairly easy to not stop a drug. You just... keep taking it. Long-term use of these drugs for maintenance purposes looks entirely feasible. Not quite as easy to maintain as a gastric bypass, but close enough to be a big deal. The same is…

Does this mean if an obese person took this drug for 2-5 years, changed their diet to eat less, they’d keep it off?

Re: ‘Breakthrough’ obesity drugs that have stunned researchers

#620
post #553

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> everyone, even the skinny folks, should be on GLP1 drugs Seriously? No thanks. Think I'll give you all a few decades to see what the long-term effects are like, and let my body largely take care of itself except when specific medical issues indicate that an intervention is in order.

The only proven way to live longer and reduce your risk of essentially every disease is to reduce caloric intake. So unless you are underweight, the benefits could outweigh any side effects. I am not advocating that everyone take these drugs--but I understand why someone might suggest it

This is false.

You burn ~50 calories per hour doing nothing.

You're saying that the only way to live longer is to lay down and do nothing and IV ~50 calories per hour into your body.

You're not going to live very long like that.

You're obviously not going to live very long if you simply never eat and starve to death.

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