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My biggest fear is either there will be long term negative consequences to Ozempic et al, and a huge swath of the population will be dealing with issues 30 year
by IncreasePosts 2y ago
My biggest fear is either there will be long term negative consequences to Ozempic et al, and a huge swath of the population will be dealing with issues 30 years form now - OR - there will be some long term positive consequence to using Ozempic et al, and I'm not getting any of the benefits because I'm not overweight.
- sss111 2y agoThere were several side effects related to pancreatic cancer associated with the precursors to GLP-1 drugs. The same companies promoting GLP-1s were responsible for driving up insulin prices. So I'm hedging my bets. There's a really cool Modern MBA video [1] on this topic btw :) [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sUoZVke_30 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sUoZVke_30
- cyberax 2y ago> There were several side effects related to pancreatic cancer In mice.
- copperx 2y agoDid the drug help pancreatic cancer?
- minifridge 2y agoIf something causes cancer in mice, the curent consensus is that it is deemed unsafe for humans.
- cyberax 2y agoNot really. Mice are naturally genetically pre-disposed to cancer. So in general, if something _doesn't_ cause cancer in mice, then it's probably safe for humans. The reverse is not necessarily true. Also, GLP-1 was associated with thyroid, not pancreatic cancer.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- akira2501 2y agoWere they humanized mice or not?
- the__alchemist 2y agoThis is a good example of a thought-terminating cliche.
- pixl97 2y ago>Large epidemiological studies have shown the link between obesity and pancreatic cancer. A large population-based case-control study of pancreatic cancer demonstrated that obesity was associated with a statistically significant 50–60% increased risk of pancreatic cancer. So does obesity, so there is that.
- BoingBoomTschak 2y agoWell, the negative consequence on the value of willpower is pretty obvious. "In what measure" is the real question.
- zarathustreal 2y agoRight, and the associated cultural impact of increasing hedonism
- cortesoft 2y agoI am confused as to how a drug that makes you want to consume less would increase hedonism? It is basically an anti-hedonism drug?
- BoingBoomTschak 2y agoHedonism is a philosophy that posits that pleasure is the sole objective good and thus pain something bad. This whole thing is about trying to find shortcuts to get to the pleasure of having a nice body while circumventing the pain and effort. Pain and efforts are important, they forge character like nothing else. If you want to live in a world where adult-children simply take their soma to get what they want, you're just not thinking about the consequences.
- cortesoft 2y agoDo you feel this way about everything? Like you shouldn't take an aspirin because you should feel the pain of your headache? You shouldn't wear shoes because you need to feel the pain of the rocks under your feet? Why is this particular thing the bad thing?
- BoingBoomTschak 2y agoImportant != superlative need. I mean, I know this is just rhetoric drivel, but I'm bored enough to reply. My post was clearly about a certain type of pain that the mind knows is a necessary path to achieving a stronger mind. Also, about headaches and more generally physical pain that you know is only temporary and not a sign of radical bodily malfunction, I say yes: enduring a reasonable amount is important to develop a tolerance to it and willpower. What I'm saying isn't new anyway, everybody knows some amount of struggle is needed to temper character and not fall to the most insidious poison of our times: constant comfort.
- gedy 2y agoKeep in mind a lot of people who'd benefit from this may not last another 30 years due to age or health issues due to weight either.
- oldpersonintx 2y ago[dead]
- m463 2y agoright the life expectancy of someone with bmi > 40 is -5 years and for bmi > 50, -15 years. So I suspect someone ~ 65 with high BMI should be on it, the side effects would be: living.
- mritchie712 2y agoHas there ever been a case where something like #2 has happened? Don't think you need to worry about that one.
- dustingetz 2y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_fluoridation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_fluoridation
- fourside 2y agoNot sure that’s apples to apples. Fluoride is a mineral. IIRC, ozempic is closer to a hormone.
- Jerrrrrrry 2y ago>Fluoride is a mineral. Even noble gases can be psychoactive.
- syndicatedjelly 2y agoFluoride and fluorine are not the same thing, and fluorine is not a noble gas
- Jerrrrrrry 2y agoThe implication to be thwarted was of "mineral" vs "hormone"; the distinction was moot, as there is no such real thing as a "drug" - all things are chemicals, and can be psychoactive to humans in either their presence or absence. Most notably (in the context of un-intuitiveness), is Xenon - it is't even a chemical, but an element - a noble one, which is almost nonsensical given most's flawed intuition. > fluorine is not a noble gas Correct, although ironically it wasn't much use in direct chemical-warfare, it was used more as a pre-cursor to enrich Uranium.
- 2y ago
- Blackthorn 2y agoGoing by the results around addiction, I'm betting on #2 with reduced alcohol consumption.
- fourside 2y agoI’m skeptical of the idea that across the general population we’d be healthier if we dialed up our insulin production. Serious question but has there ever been a case of humans benefitting from increasing a hormone like this? Since it’s an injection, It wouldn’t be a steady increase, but more likely have bursts of it. I don’t know how healthy that would be in the long run. After what happened with OxyContin I think wed benefit from some skepticism when a new drug gets oversold.
- aantix 2y agoGLP-1's have been around since 2005. Exenatide. They're not new.
- pixl97 2y ago> Serious question but has there ever been a case of humans benefitting from increasing a hormone like this? By itself this might be an ok question, but in context it's rather useless.... Diet and obesity changes by both lowering and increasing different hormone outputs in your body. You're balancing the question of "how is this hormone" versus "How bad is obesity on the body". Well, the answer is in, obesity is extremely unhealthy on the body in both the short and long term. Drug overdoses cause somewhere around 100k deaths per year in the US. Obesity complications related deaths are in the 250-300k deaths per year. You can be skeptical as you want, but behind smoking, obesity is the worst epidemic in the US.
- gcr 2y agoI can understand this perspective. You're looking at it with healthy eyes. But for fat people, the calculus looks different. A decision to take semaglutides is a decision between the long-term negative effects of obesity *now*, or the possibility of long-term negative effects *later.* Anecdotally, trans people have a similar calculus. Going unmedicated/unsupported brings significant mental health risk now[1], whereas going on hormone replacement may or may not cause complications much later in life (osteoperosis, hepotoxicity issues for some treatments, etc). Either way, you gotta get to the "later in life" part before you can worry about the outlook there. 1: a CDC meta-review said that 26% of surveyed US trans students attempted suicide this year, N=20,103 surveyed, ~660 of which were trans. https://archive.ph/0H81G https://archive.ph/0H81G
- jncfhnb 2y agoI was curious and a bit skeptical that sex change operations materially affected suicide rates for trans people but available papers tended to find significant effect sizes of about 50% reduction
- 0x1ceb00da 2y agoDid that study account for the socioeconomic status of the participants? Common sense suggests that people who can afford to undergo such surgeries would tend to be richer, more supported, and from better neighborhoods.
- tjohns 2y agoThere's certainly room for more research here, but some of them do attempt to account for other socioeconomic factors. It's worth noting that surgery isn't the only option. Hormone therapy has also shown to reduce suicide risk, which is more accessible across socioeconomic strata. There's a meta-analysis here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10027312/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10027312/
- jlawson 2y agoThe data is poor quality. It's not like you can randomize who gets a sex change operation. And there are major issues with even knowing who to count when people can just decide they're not trans any more. All the research on this is riven with such unhandled problems. The research is also highly motivated. A researcher who found that sex change operations were harmful would be targeted for endless harassment by gender activists, if they could get published at all.
- epolanski 2y ago[flagged]
- al_borland 2y ago> I'm not getting any of the benefits because I'm not overweight. You’re already benefiting.
- bryanlarsen 2y ago> a huge swath of the population will be dealing with issues 30 years form now We've got 20 years of data on this class of drug. Certainly there could be some long term issues that we're not aware of yet, but it's not likely that there are significant issues that affect a large percentage of users after 30 years that didn't affect the small sample of users that have been using it for 20 years or the massive number of users that have been using it for 10.
- DonnyV 2y agoHow much of the data was done independent and how much was done by the same company or companies that benefit from it? We've seen this before. How many decades did people take aspirin thinking it was good for you to take everyday. How many decades did people drink wine thinking it was good for you in small dosage? How many people smoked using it as an appetite suppressant not knowing the long term effects? The list goes on forever. I'm betting this ends the same way.
- pixl97 2y agoHow much data do we have on obesity and the effects of it?
- vessenes 2y agoDude, the mortality rates go up at least linearly, maybe super-linearly, to weight over a certain amount. It's not like some mythical / hard to read / later benefit. This is a drug that radically changes those risks NOW, really quickly. It's a different matter than aspirin (helpful if heart disease is a real risk, otherwise no) or wine or smoking, both of which people have a strong interest in thinking of as good for you.
- DonnyV 2y agoYes being overweight is horrible for you. But fixing it with a pill that you don't know the long term effects of and not actually fixing the root of the problem. Why you gained the weight in the first place. Is helping no one. If anything you could be fixing something in the short term and causing long term harm in the ladder.
- bee_rider 2y agoMedical FOMO? I wouldn’t worry too much about it, I mean, there are hypothetical upsides to countless decisions we haven’t made, right? We always miss some chances in life.
- anigbrowl 2y agoOR - there will be some long term positive consequence to using Ozempic et al, and I'm not getting any of the benefits because I'm not overweight Who the fuck cares? If you're not overweight and are reasonably then you're already winning in physiological terms. If you can maintain a good quality of life into old age and then die, what more do you want? Going through life worrying about whether you're missing out on some marginal health benefit from the drug-of-the-moment is neurotic.
- pajeets 2y agoi think overweightness should be seen more as a symptom and I share parent's concerns about ozempic's long term side effects being unknowable in the present all in all general unease about dealing with symptoms and not the root cause of overweightness except in rare genetic cases, its overwhelmingly a dietary/exercise issue. in this country the pill/drug is the answer and solution to everything but all this does is pile on more bandages without addressing the root cause which a very American solution. I do not think the full ramifications are realized or knowable when there are profits to be made on both side of the fence, sort of like the whole opiate crisis in America started out as magazine ads blew up into a major crisis 20~30 years later.
- julianeon 2y agoBut consider the tradeoff: it's okay to have serious health issues in 30 years, if you were projected to die in 20 years without it.
- thr0waway001 2y agoThat's why I haven't taken it. I'm probably a guy who should. Overweight, with kidney disease person who, if I became diabetic, it would probably kill me. I'm not, someone who doesn't really need it. For example, some average weight housewife who just wants to fit in a dress a little better. And still, I won't use it even though I can afford it cause it's the long term consequences are not entirely understood.
- webninja 2y agoYeah, once you start taking it, you can’t stop. It becomes a lifetime commitment.