3 ms·

At 150$ a month this is tempting, but I'm worried it's going to cause cancer or something.

atonse 10mo ago
I fear the same thing but then people that know more about this say that these GLP-1 drugs have been used for many years (by diabetics) so they aren't untested or un-studied. Don't know how accurate that is, though.
- JumpCrisscross 10mo ago
  > Don't know how accurate that is Literally from the Wikipedia article: “In 2002, Eli Lilly partnered with Amylin to develop exenatide and secure approval to market the drug. Exenatide's 2005 approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration showed that targeting the GLP-1 receptor was a viable strategy and inspired other pharmaceutical companies to focus on that receptor” [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLP-1_receptor_agonist https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLP-1_receptor_agonist
dexwiz 10mo ago
Nah, you'll just be on it for the rest of your life. Drug companies prefer chronic illnesses since they cannot be cured, and recipients take the drug for life. All these hormones (GLP, testosterones, hrt) will need to be taken forever. Very few people come off GLP-1 and keep weight off.
- JumpCrisscross 10mo ago
  > Drug companies prefer chronic illnesses Gilead has made bank on Solvadi, a drug that cures a previously-chronic disease [1]. > Very few people come off GLP-1 and keep weight off Rebound can be close to 100% if you’re severely obese, but for most people it’s much less [2]. (Everyone I know who was taking it two years ago is off it, and they eat and exercise healthier than they did.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofosbuvir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofosbuvir [2] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35441470/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35441470/
- davey48016 10mo ago
  But how many of those people would have ever lost the weight in the first place without GLP-1?
- toomuchtodo 10mo ago
  Maybe not. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46348199 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46348199
- array_key_first 10mo ago
  I mean, obesity is a chronic illness, so is hypogonadism. If your balls don't work they don't work. Chronic illnesses require chronic medication. The same is true even WITHOUT the medication. If you're obese and want to lose the weight, you need to manage your diet and exercise. Forever. Until the day you die. You can't ever stop that or you'll be obese again. Some things just don't have one-time solutions, and that's okay.
aduwah 10mo ago
So far they proved to do the opposite.
Someone1234 10mo ago
Obesity has a known, well established, multi-modal cancer risk, and then on top add metabolic syndrome (T2, heart disease, etc). So, you're weighing a hypothetical risk against and establish risk, and concluding that the unknown risk is scarier than the known risk. Which is irrational. Imagine if someone asks you if you want to take the "obesity pill," and you looked at the side effects objectively. But instead you weight obesity as "normal" and this as "new and scary."
- 999900000999 10mo ago
  To be completely honest I don't 100% trust the medical industry whenever there's so much money behind marketing something. There's a very real vested interest in trying to downplay the risk factors because let's just say tomorrow they found out this stuff makes all your teeth fall out. A whole lot of folks would lose billions of dollars. My first instinct is to think I need to go and take another Europe. The food is better there and I lost a good amount of weight the first time.
  - Someone1234 10mo ago
    Understood. You may be interested to learn that Liraglutide, a GLP-1 Agonist, has been commercially available and commonly used since 2010 (15-years+) without any unknown/unexpected additional side-effects appearing. It was developed in 1998. The main reason GLP-1 Agonists are suddenly more popular is two things: - Liraglutide had to be taken daily, instead of weekly. - Nobody every paid for Liraglutide to be clinically approved for weight-loss. It was an anti-diabetic medication; but the mechanism of action is the same. Compared with liraglutide, semaglutide was engineered mainly with a longer, differently attached fatty-acid side chain that increases albumin binding and slows clearance, so it lasts longer; both drugs activate the GLP-1 receptor.
  - array_key_first 10mo ago
    To be fair, if this stuff did make your teeth fall out, that would still be worth it. Everything is risk calculus. If you're just a bit overweight, then yeah probably not worth the risk. If you're morbidly obese then it's a no brainer. I will say this: the bar for obesity is lower than most people think.
happosai 10mo ago
There is a minor risk that a new drug causes cancer or something. However, obesity is a major risk for very large amount of health problems, including many cancers.

atonse 10mo ago

I fear the same thing but then people that know more about this say that these GLP-1 drugs have been used for many years (by diabetics) so they aren't untested or un-studied. Don't know how accurate that is, though.

JumpCrisscross 10mo ago
> Don't know how accurate that is Literally from the Wikipedia article: “In 2002, Eli Lilly partnered with Amylin to develop exenatide and secure approval to market the drug. Exenatide's 2005 approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration showed that targeting the GLP-1 receptor was a viable strategy and inspired other pharmaceutical companies to focus on that receptor” [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLP-1_receptor_agonist https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLP-1_receptor_agonist

dexwiz 10mo ago

Nah, you'll just be on it for the rest of your life. Drug companies prefer chronic illnesses since they cannot be cured, and recipients take the drug for life. All these hormones (GLP, testosterones, hrt) will need to be taken forever. Very few people come off GLP-1 and keep weight off.

JumpCrisscross 10mo ago
> Drug companies prefer chronic illnesses Gilead has made bank on Solvadi, a drug that cures a previously-chronic disease [1]. > Very few people come off GLP-1 and keep weight off Rebound can be close to 100% if you’re severely obese, but for most people it’s much less [2]. (Everyone I know who was taking it two years ago is off it, and they eat and exercise healthier than they did.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofosbuvir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofosbuvir [2] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35441470/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35441470/
davey48016 10mo ago
But how many of those people would have ever lost the weight in the first place without GLP-1?
toomuchtodo 10mo ago
Maybe not. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46348199 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46348199
array_key_first 10mo ago
I mean, obesity is a chronic illness, so is hypogonadism. If your balls don't work they don't work. Chronic illnesses require chronic medication. The same is true even WITHOUT the medication. If you're obese and want to lose the weight, you need to manage your diet and exercise. Forever. Until the day you die. You can't ever stop that or you'll be obese again. Some things just don't have one-time solutions, and that's okay.

aduwah 10mo ago

So far they proved to do the opposite.

Someone1234 10mo ago

Obesity has a known, well established, multi-modal cancer risk, and then on top add metabolic syndrome (T2, heart disease, etc). So, you're weighing a hypothetical risk against and establish risk, and concluding that the unknown risk is scarier than the known risk. Which is irrational. Imagine if someone asks you if you want to take the "obesity pill," and you looked at the side effects objectively. But instead you weight obesity as "normal" and this as "new and scary."

999900000999 10mo ago
To be completely honest I don't 100% trust the medical industry whenever there's so much money behind marketing something. There's a very real vested interest in trying to downplay the risk factors because let's just say tomorrow they found out this stuff makes all your teeth fall out. A whole lot of folks would lose billions of dollars. My first instinct is to think I need to go and take another Europe. The food is better there and I lost a good amount of weight the first time.
- Someone1234 10mo ago
  Understood. You may be interested to learn that Liraglutide, a GLP-1 Agonist, has been commercially available and commonly used since 2010 (15-years+) without any unknown/unexpected additional side-effects appearing. It was developed in 1998. The main reason GLP-1 Agonists are suddenly more popular is two things: - Liraglutide had to be taken daily, instead of weekly. - Nobody every paid for Liraglutide to be clinically approved for weight-loss. It was an anti-diabetic medication; but the mechanism of action is the same. Compared with liraglutide, semaglutide was engineered mainly with a longer, differently attached fatty-acid side chain that increases albumin binding and slows clearance, so it lasts longer; both drugs activate the GLP-1 receptor.
- array_key_first 10mo ago
  To be fair, if this stuff did make your teeth fall out, that would still be worth it. Everything is risk calculus. If you're just a bit overweight, then yeah probably not worth the risk. If you're morbidly obese then it's a no brainer. I will say this: the bar for obesity is lower than most people think.

happosai 10mo ago

There is a minor risk that a new drug causes cancer or something. However, obesity is a major risk for very large amount of health problems, including many cancers.