Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

today.ucsd.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 211 posts

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#191

Post by azinman2 »

robbomacrae wrote: post #43
azinman2 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is also an extremely rare vision problem. So absolute numbers are very tiny. The absolute numbers for diabetes, weight related problems, etc far dwarf this.

Right. On the whole I think these things are incredible.. looking to try myself after reading here in HN the other day about it working for all sorts of distractions. Just wanted to point out it's not all sunshine and rainbows which would certainly be suspicious.

Literally too much water or aspirin can kill you. Some people are allergic to avocados. Driving kills huge numbers of people daily. Everything is about risk/reward, and looking at the macro picture. And right now the comorbidities for obesity are terrible in huge absolute numbers… something that GLP-1’s can take down in significant magnitude. Unless we learn that the majority of users end up with something worse than obesity, they’re a huge win for public health.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#192

Post by itchyouch »

ifwinterco wrote: post #138
itchyouch wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An interesting FYI is a comment made by Peter Attia on his podcast. He had a patient with metabolic markers that were not improving and they had exhausted all the typical avenues. Presumably they were things like weight loss. They put the patient on GLP-1 but injected into the thighs (or butt, I don't recall) for the metabolic benefits without the hunger blunting effects. It seems like GLP1, even in skinny patients (…

It shouldn't make any difference where you pin it, it's systemic it just has to be administered subcutaneously because it's a peptide and it isn't orally active. Don't listen to these YouTubers about health and fitness, most of them are clueless

There were no recommendations.

Usually this type of anecdata becomes the basis of legitimate, controlled studies and over time can inform and/or adjust.

It would be premature to simply write off all influencers or limiting to only accept the medical profession as the immutable truth.

The reality tends to exist somewhere in the middle, outside of a formal proof.

I've listened to many health influencers and among the legitimate and balanced tend to be Rhonda Patrick and Peter Attia.

Attia provides guidelines for how to think about items, but usually it's the fan base that tends to sully the messaging as the base tends to be far more polarized and dogmatic over bits.

It is interesting to see that there is another poster confirming a slightly different effect though. Regardless of things being "systemic", just understanding that fluids dynamics are complex, I imagine diffusion of a systemic molecule like GLp1 could possibly be variable? Or perhaps there is a localized tissue fatigue?

Many potential options do exist to propose as hypothesis.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#193

Post by itchyouch »

ifwinterco wrote: post #138
itchyouch wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An interesting FYI is a comment made by Peter Attia on his podcast. He had a patient with metabolic markers that were not improving and they had exhausted all the typical avenues. Presumably they were things like weight loss. They put the patient on GLP-1 but injected into the thighs (or butt, I don't recall) for the metabolic benefits without the hunger blunting effects. It seems like GLP1, even in skinny patients (…

It shouldn't make any difference where you pin it, it's systemic it just has to be administered subcutaneously because it's a peptide and it isn't orally active. Don't listen to these YouTubers about health and fitness, most of them are clueless

While the area under the curve for glp1 administration may be the same, good chance that the story is informing us of a mechanism such as the absorption rate between two different sites.

Slower absorption in the thigh may blunt the immediate peak dosing and the acute hunger effects.

As always, the small details matter. I'd guess that pharmacology also has their own thundering herd problem with the dosing of certain drugs.

One of the interesting bits about pharmacology seems to not be the active molecule as much as the innovations in delivery mechanism.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#194

Post by Libidinalecon »

unsupp0rted wrote: post #23
bicx wrote: post #2

Maybe I'm just an aging cynic, but I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop when it comes to GLP-1s. There have been so many claims of positive benefits that it almost seems too good to be true. With them being so expensive, the producers have every incentive to upsell using any study they can get their hands or money on. If it's all upside, then I'm happy to be wrong.

Not everything has another shoe to drop. Getting people to eat more broccoli is almost entirely upside. Sure a handful of people will be allergic or whatever, but on a population level some interventions are just one positive after another, and there's no reason it has to be a deal made with the devil.

It is really hard to compare broccoli to a powerful, rather new peptide that causes profound behavioral changes.

Usually you don't get a free lunch with such a compound.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#195

Post by cman1444 »

CobrastanJorji wrote: post #122
WillPostForFood wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many people do you feel liek you are personally responsible for killing because you haven't given 100% of your disposal income to food relief? Hundreds? Thousands?

This isn't "I could use my money to acquire food for the poor." It's "I'm going to prevent anyone else from selling food, and that will let me charge 100x as much for food."

And yet, if the system wasn't set up this way it's likely that these medicines would never have been developed in the first place.

If we take away investor returns now, why would they ever pursue developing similarly effective drugs in the future?

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#196

Post by JumpCrisscross »

surfsvammel wrote: post #59

I am on GLP-1 (very low dose), and I’ve found that it seems to help me moderate my alcohol consumption as well. Maybe some thing like that could also be contributing to the effect.

Would you mind sharing what BMI you had when you started treatment and through whom you went? Curious about the low/micro dose effects.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#197

Post by dredmorbius »

foobarian wrote: post #150
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I for one don't "require" three meals a day, but I'm hungry in the morning, ergo, I like breakfast. It's not so much about how often you eat but what and how much. Generally speaking, of course, I can't speak for any benefits of intermittent fasting (assuming equal daily calorie / macronutrient intake) because I'm uneducated in that regard. But TL;DR, I will agree that desk jockeys will need less calories than people…

Maybe this goes away after a while, but when I tried this in the past I get so hungry I can't think or work. So clearly it's a non-starter for me on work days.

One approach is to first reduce carbs (and particularly highly-processed carbs), then begin intermittent fasting. An initial lower-carb diet for 2--4 weeks may help with compliance on the IF diet.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#198

Post by dredmorbius »

InMice wrote: post #129
cyrusradfar wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. I'm a big fan of intermittent and water fasting. Have seen things in my blood work that doctors would require me on meds to reverse. Outside of that, I can't speak to the positive impacts on my mood, and general ability to focus. The simplest solution to a lot of problems is consuming less with the assumption that, most of us (maybe not you), have a lot of spare energy sitting around. A lie that we don't unle…

ALmost everyone who shares their positive, any length fasting experience here gets downvoted. I will always upvote them. Ive done two 48 hour fasts and they were so relaxing and felt so natural. It just feels great to occasionally go about your day and not eat anything. Your gut tries to heal itself in between meals. The fact that almost all of HN just cant stand anyone mention they fast with positive benefits (and m…

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9562917>

Just make your point, as clearly and persuasively as possible.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#199

Post by dredmorbius »

chrisco255 wrote: post #126
thefz wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many Americans drive a car every da Coincidentally also a factor of why many Americans take GLP-1 frugs

Not really, Americans have been driving cars for over 100 years but the obesity epidemic cropped up in the last 30 years.

The automobile's net effect on behaviours has (as others have noted) evolved over that period, as has its net effect on transportation and urbanisation patterns.

Up until the end of WWII, automobile ownership was relatively limited. It was just beginning to accelerate at the beginning of the war (in the US), but rationing and war-time defence manufacturing curbed that trend, and sustained rates of alternative transport, particularly rail.

Post-war, there was a mass-consumer blitz, much of it revolving around automobiles, and changes such as commuter suburbs (based around automobiles), superhighways, self-service grocery stores, shopping malls, and strip-mall based retail development began, all trends which evolved over the next 50+ years.

In the 1970s and 1980s, it was quite common for children to walk or ride bikes to school, or take a school bus (which involved walking several blocks to a nearby stop). Since the late 1990s, far more seem to be ferried in private cars, usually by parents, who spend a half-hour or more in pick-up lines. It's not uncommon for children walking along neighbourhood streets to be reported (and collected) by authorities by concern for their safety, and their parents subject to investigation or worse. Suburban, and even urban development patterns have been to ever-lower-density and far more bike- and pedstrian-unfriendly modes.

Recreational, occupational, educational, and other transport and activity patterns are largely away from self-powered movement (walking, cycling, etc.) and toward motorised options (sometimes including e-bikes, electric scooters, or equivalents, though most often automobiles).

Societal change and consequent impacts take time and have long lags.

Re: GLP-1 drugs linked to lower death rates in colon cancer patients

#200

Post by dehrmann »

Noaidi wrote: post #57

I do not like the framing. GLP-1 drugs help people lose weight, and it is the weight loss that lowers death rates in colon cancer[1]. This is making it sound like the drug itself is reducing cancer. [1] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12672-025-03902-4

Whether or not this is the case for this particular study, I wouldn't be surprised if they end up being miracle drugs that reduce everything from heart disease to liver disease to cancer through weight loss and reduced alcohol consumption.
Post reply on HN