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Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

theatlantic.com

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Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#81
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am really concerned this is going to lead to a bigger health crises than the one it purported to solve. A lot of diabetics taking it to regulate blood sugar (particular the feedback loop with insulin and hunger) have said it's changed their life... but for people who are merely overweight I think the benefits may not always be worth the side effects. IMO the correlation between weight and health is not as strong…

I think weight is the wrong thing to target for gauging health, but it is the thing that is in everyone's face and easy to see. Undernourishment is just a big of a problem as over-nourishment. Targeting the four horsemen(t2 diabetes, Alzheimer's, heart disease, cancer) is a better use of time and money, but they are relatively much harder to identify early.

> Undernourishment is just a big of a problem as over-nourishment.

Having been recently diagnosed with Crohn's I 100% agree. Getting skinnier during a bad flare makes people think I'm in better health, because I look a certain way that aligns with their expectations, but it really just means my gut isn't absorbing any nutrients. Turns out being at my lowest weight in years was a Very Bad Thing and not a sign I was doing anything right.

Which, again, is an interesting juxtaposition with my partner who weighs more than me but whose body functions correctly and whose biomarkers come back normal, unlike mine.

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#82
post #30

[flagged]

Unfortunately, suggesting that people eat less and exercise more doesn’t seem to actually work that well. We’ve been trying that for decades and the obesity epidemic just keeps getting worse.

Probably because people aren't acting on it, or sticking with it long enough to actually see results.

Especially in today's world when they can just take a pill and loose 10-15 pounds, nobody wants to do something they probably don't like doing (consistent exercise or healthy eating) as part of a short-term or long-term process.

A lot of people, especially those in food deserts or without access to adequate nutrition on a consistent basis (or those who cannot afford quality food, or those unable to prepare it properly) are not going to undergo something where change is gradual versus taking a magic pill, side effects be damned. Sad, but that's the world we live in.

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean if you know ahead of time the thing you're doing is going to produce buggy code then yep your analogy holds.

Yeah, it's weird, right? But people keep putting use-after-free bugs everywhere. Like, do the OpenBSD guys not know that this is a bug (and worse, a security bug)? They keep putting them everywhere. A few years ago they stuck one in OpenSMTPD. Theo de Raadt would benefit from reading some Hacker News.

That's like saying obese people are the same as bodybuilders because they both eat surplus calories and have high BMI.

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#84
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not holding Ozempic to needing to be the cure for anything. My point is that people without diabetes are looking to this drug for weight loss, at which point they create a dangerous dependency, with no hard evidence that their actual health improves. This is opposed to coming up with long term solutions that involve re-evaluating daily decisions that lead to some of these diseases in the first place. If Ozempic…

Is it really a dangerous dependency ? There's been no evidence of anything happening once individuals go off of semaglutide or tirzepatide other than the tendency of gaining weight to the original levels and/or blood sugar readings returning to the pre-medication levels. This is the most common outcome anyone has trying literally any calorie-reducing diet, medication or not. There's no evidence that people are ending…

I don’t necessarily mean dangerous in the health aspect, although long term affects of these drugs are not know yet…I mean the dependency on needed the drug to keep a certain lifestyle, and then having an “oh shit” moment when you’re in a place that you can’t access it, whether that be traveling or the supply of it becomes scarce, or it gets banned, etc

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#85
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Healthier in what sense? There is little knowledge of long term side effects and it isn't even approved for weight loss, it is specifically for people with diabetes.

Semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic, is absolutely approved in the US for weight loss. Ozempic is the trade name for the diabetes medication, Wegovy is the trade name for the weight loss medication. They are the exact same medication, in the same formulation.

Ah, good to know!

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The manual for Alli makes it clear that orlistat treatment involves aversion therapy, encouraging the user to associate eating fat with unpleasant treatment effects. Christ. This is like Crohn's disease in pill form. One too many teaspoons of olive oil and you're in for an unpleasant evening...

I remember grabbing a pamphlet when it was new and reading their recommendation to wear dark colored pants and bring a change of clothes to work.

[flagged]

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#87
"Semaglutide does not dull all pleasure, people taking the drug for weight loss told me. They could still enjoy a few bites of food or revel in finding the perfect dress; they just no longer went overboard. Anhedonia, or a general diminished ability to experience pleasure, also hasn’t shown up in cohorts of people who take the drug for diabetes, says Elisabet Jerlhag Holm, an addiction researcher at the University of Gothenburg."

So it doesn't dull all pleasure just almost all so it's not technically anhedonia...

I dunno, still seem pretty fucking bleak to me.

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#88
post #30

[flagged]

> Sad that the obvious route (diet and exercise) is skipped by so many people

Many people also try it repeatedly for several years or even decades, failing all the while. There's also psychological issues that make this hard (possibly among other issues), and no pithy remedy like "try diet and exercise" for that (well, ok, sometimes people say "try therapy" this way, but we can include people who've included that for several years too.)

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#89

"Semaglutide does not dull all pleasure, people taking the drug for weight loss told me. They could still enjoy a few bites of food or revel in finding the perfect dress; they just no longer went overboard. Anhedonia, or a general diminished ability to experience pleasure, also hasn’t shown up in cohorts of people who take the drug for diabetes, says Elisabet Jerlhag Holm, an addiction researcher at the University of…

Our experience exists on a series of spectrums, some people experience pleasure way too intensely and it actually causes problems which is why this might be a good thing

Obviously there are people who like the pleasure given to them by food a bit too much and they consistently overindulge, it can be that way for many things as well. I'm not saying that the cause is always related but for many it may be

Re: Ozempic drug supresses desire to smoke, drink and more?

#90

"Semaglutide does not dull all pleasure, people taking the drug for weight loss told me. They could still enjoy a few bites of food or revel in finding the perfect dress; they just no longer went overboard. Anhedonia, or a general diminished ability to experience pleasure, also hasn’t shown up in cohorts of people who take the drug for diabetes, says Elisabet Jerlhag Holm, an addiction researcher at the University of…

Addiction is often extremely distressing. Dulled pleasure can be far better than drinking yourself into a stupor every single night.
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