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Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

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Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#161

Post by photochemsyn »

talkingtab wrote: post #96

It concerns me how discussions, such as this one go on HN. This is an important topic. With the epidemic of obesity we now find a drug that appeals to a large number of people. This is an important topic as well. What is the current comment receiving most of the comment? "That's the sort of headlines that smells like bullshit to me" That's the sort of comment that smells like bullshit to me. What kind of place is thi…

The developers of these new peptide-based hormone-acting drugs like semaglutide(ozempic) could be called biohackers, but the system they're hacking on - the human endocrine system - is a delicate system. Introducing semi-synthetic mimics of native hormones can go wrong in all kinds of ways, and hormone-analogue drugs have a poor track record (anabolic steroids, DES, etc.) so extra caution makes sense.

Semaglutide is based on a 31-amino acid polypeptide that mimics the human GLP-1 hormone. At position 26, the lysine side chain is conjugated with a fatty diacid chain, to slow degradation and prolongs half-life, and there are some other modifications. However, the target - the GLP receptor - is not just expressed in the intestinal tract but all through the body, in muscle, central nervous system, immune system, kidneys and others. So some unexpected effects beyond the desired ones are likely.

Semaglutide was recently shown to have potent effects on the heart, and possibly beneficial to certain heart disease conditions associated with obesity. Makes me suspect this drug should be restricted to clinically obese cases where strong intervention with close medical supervision is needed. However for healthy people who just want to lose a relatively small amount of weight it really doesn't seem wise.

"Semaglutide ameliorates cardiac remodeling in male mice by optimizing energy substrate utilization..." (June 2024)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-48970-2

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#162

Post by nfw2 »

seizethecheese wrote: post #153
elevatedastalt wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The HN you are yearning for disappeared about 8-10 years ago when it was largely taken over by normies and people way outside the hard-core-tech fold. It's not very different from Reddit front-page now if the topic is even remotely political. For purely technical topics you expect good quality discussion, but those threads barely get comments in the two digits.

I’m sure complaining about HN is as old as HN.

Specifically comparing HN to reddit is old as well. It's mentioned in the guidelines to not say HN is turning into reddit. The examples of this shared in the guidelines go back to 2007

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#163

Post by echelon »

abtinf wrote: post #136
talkingtab wrote: post #96

It concerns me how discussions, such as this one go on HN. This is an important topic. With the epidemic of obesity we now find a drug that appeals to a large number of people. This is an important topic as well. What is the current comment receiving most of the comment? "That's the sort of headlines that smells like bullshit to me" That's the sort of comment that smells like bullshit to me. What kind of place is thi…

I agree with your desire for what HN should be, and disagree with your assessment that the top voted comment doesn’t support it. HN is the only forum I know of that has broadly grasped that most so-called “science” outside of the hard sciences and mathematics is complete garbage and driven by funding needs. The world is awash in non-knowledge. This is an extremely serious issue. Building the skill to rapidly come to…

> disagree with your assessment that the top voted comment doesn’t support it.

Did you read the paper or skim its abstract, figures, and conclusion? I'm not so sure that commenter did, or they may have cited this,

> Because we report smaller cardiomyocytes in cultured cells and in mice treated with semaglutide, it is tempting to speculate that semaglutide may induce cardiac atrophy. However, we do not observe any changes in recognized markers of atrophy such as Murf1 and Atrogin-1. Thus, we cannot be certain that semaglutide induces atrophy per se or if it does, it may occur via molecular pathways that have not been identified herein.

> Building the skill to rapidly come to a preliminarily judgement of a headline is crucial.

You can't judge this paper based on the popsci headline.

> most so-called “science” outside of the hard sciences and mathematics is complete garbage and driven by funding needs

Based on my reading of the figures and conclusion, I don't think you should call this paper garbage.

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#164

Post by theendisney »

hnthrowaway0328 wrote: post #144
andy_ppp wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Add walking for 2h per day is the recommended I’ve seen.

Thanks, 2h is a bit too much for me, so what I do is about 3-4 10-12 mins walk-sprint walk reps. Basically half walk (3.5m/h) and half sprint-walk (4.4m/h). I wish I could do more but my joints are not really good.

Just walking is better. You get a steady burn. If you do high intensity you burn calories for a good while afterwards. Mild intensity doesnt do much.

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#165

Post by 7e »

loeg wrote: post #39

So like, it's interesting that this happens in mice, but we did not see increased heart disease in human RCTs of these drugs. Maybe the mouse dose is just absurdly high? "Mice were then administered semaglutide 120 μg/kg/d for 21 days." That could be vaguely reasonable -- human doses range from, idk, ~36 to ~200 μg/kg/d (2.5mg/week to 15mg/week at ~100kg).

They found the mice did not suffer from any heart problems, so it’s not surprising.

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#166

Post by kiba »

abtinf wrote: post #136
talkingtab wrote: post #96

It concerns me how discussions, such as this one go on HN. This is an important topic. With the epidemic of obesity we now find a drug that appeals to a large number of people. This is an important topic as well. What is the current comment receiving most of the comment? "That's the sort of headlines that smells like bullshit to me" That's the sort of comment that smells like bullshit to me. What kind of place is thi…

I agree with your desire for what HN should be, and disagree with your assessment that the top voted comment doesn’t support it. HN is the only forum I know of that has broadly grasped that most so-called “science” outside of the hard sciences and mathematics is complete garbage and driven by funding needs. The world is awash in non-knowledge. This is an extremely serious issue. Building the skill to rapidly come to…

The most reliable source of knowledge we have are in the science. This is further reinforced by technological development that validated the sciences, although at time the technology may precede the science.

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#167

Post by kiba »

burningChrome wrote: post #150
talkingtab wrote: post #96

It concerns me how discussions, such as this one go on HN. This is an important topic. With the epidemic of obesity we now find a drug that appeals to a large number of people. This is an important topic as well. What is the current comment receiving most of the comment? "That's the sort of headlines that smells like bullshit to me" That's the sort of comment that smells like bullshit to me. What kind of place is thi…

The cure for obesity isn't a pill. Remember in the 80's and 90's when exercising and being healthy was considered a cool thing? Remember there was a gym on every corner and people were all about looking good and being healthy, eating healthy and living longer? Then somewhere. . . - We started normalizing obesity. - We started this whole "body positivity" trend that celebrating morbidly obese people like Lizzo as posi…

This is nonsense. The majority of the population don't want to be fat, ugly, and unhealthy and want to persists in maintaining good healthy habits in which they don't eat junk food.

People who promotes fat positivity are ridiculed.

Blaming it on culture overly simplify the issue, which is going to be a complex mix of interacting causes.

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#168

Post by kiba »

NotYourLawyer wrote: post #132
talkingtab wrote: post #96

It concerns me how discussions, such as this one go on HN. This is an important topic. With the epidemic of obesity we now find a drug that appeals to a large number of people. This is an important topic as well. What is the current comment receiving most of the comment? "That's the sort of headlines that smells like bullshit to me" That's the sort of comment that smells like bullshit to me. What kind of place is thi…

To be fair, that comment was about the claim: > emerging research showing that up to 40 per cent of the weight lost by people using weight-loss drugs is actually muscle Which is… obviously bullshit.

You lose muscle when you lose weight, especially if weight loss is rapid. This is why it's important to be physically active when you're losing weight. It doesn't matter if you're on drug or not.

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#169

Post by parpfish »

elevatedastalt wrote: post #118
talkingtab wrote: post #96

It concerns me how discussions, such as this one go on HN. This is an important topic. With the epidemic of obesity we now find a drug that appeals to a large number of people. This is an important topic as well. What is the current comment receiving most of the comment? "That's the sort of headlines that smells like bullshit to me" That's the sort of comment that smells like bullshit to me. What kind of place is thi…

The HN you are yearning for disappeared about 8-10 years ago when it was largely taken over by normies and people way outside the hard-core-tech fold. It's not very different from Reddit front-page now if the topic is even remotely political. For purely technical topics you expect good quality discussion, but those threads barely get comments in the two digits.

If you think HN users are normies, I think you might be in a bubble. Normies ain’t this literate.

Re: Weight-loss drug found to shrink muscle in mice, human cells

#170

Post by 123yawaworht456 »

burnt-resistor wrote: post #116
throwup238 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve heard that anecdote from HN users many times but based on my meatspace social group of (mostly) California yuppies, that effect is vastly overstated. Even some of the diabetics I know on Ozempic have started using it as an excuse for a shittier diet. Now my sample size is barely ten people on Ozempic/Wegovy so take it with a grain of salt and what not, but I’m skeptical. I bet there’s a large group of people - p…

I take mirtazepene because it's the only antidepressant that works for me; unfortunately, it's also a massive orexigetic. And also unfortunately I have original Medicare that doesn't cover semaglutide until I develop additional heart problems or diabetes, so I'm forced to buy compounded semaglutide for 10% of the retail cost (but still higher than the rest of the world) out-of-pocket from a local large, retail, indep…

no wonder you're depressed
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