Novo Nordisk Launches Wegovy Weight-Loss Pill in Us, Triggering Price War

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Several GLP-1 pills are in the pipeline, and there is near bottomless R&D budgets being spent on the area currently, but it isn't here yet and this isn't "it."

I'd strongly suggest people ignore this release, and keep using injectable Semaglutide/Tirzepatide.

They don't.

Because despite being labeled as not-for-profit, they will always scale up their "cost" to match their revenues, and live on the 1-2% difference.

They want the absolute nominal dollar values for care to be as high as humanly possible.

Obesity mostly causes expensive problems years later. People stay in their jobs for an average of something like 3-4 years. By the time anyone has an issue, it's the next guy's problem (or ideally, Medicare's).

Furthermore, GLP-1 users report having fewer cravings or just reduced appetite in general, whereas what you describe would require some sort of "calorie reduction pill" which would allow people to lose weight without altering their relationship to food. But that pill does not exist.

Probably not. Food manufacturing is not high margin. The things that would make "products actually healthier" are higher cost both in terms of inputs and in terms of shorter shelf life.

If people eat less and total sales volume decreases, there will not be additional money to change products lines. Expect corporate consolidation and a focus on children and glp-holdout populations, similar to cigarette manufacturers.

Similar to vapes, I could see the development of "ceremonial foods" that are chewed but not swallowed, like gum but with broader effects. Imagine something that approximates the experience of the crinkly bag, oily smell and physical crunch sensation of chips that then evaporates after the crunch. It would maybe even have a double bag for discretely spitting out the too small to crunch anymore shards of a saliva-phobic food grade meta-material.

Maybe, but with the new pressure of "people are eating less" to deal with.

I think the current NOVA Classification for Ultra Processed Foods is flawed and often drops food containing preservatives and stabilizers into the same bucket as nutritionally poor items.

It also doesn't do a good job distinguishing value or health outcomes from consumption and simply lumps all UPFs into the same bucket. In otherwords fortified whole-grain breads and sodas are both UPFs but objectively they are not the same in terms of nutritional value or health outcomes.

The NOVA Classification's intent is to flag products where processing replaces whole foods, or adds cosmetic or functional additives to engineer taste/texture. It doesn't really factor in actual nutritional value or health outcomes from consumption.

We need to come up with a better system to identify to denote healthy or unhealthy foods, and also to identify foods that contain ingredients that have unknown impacts on our health outcome. Our current regulatory environment is to permit until proven harmful, so having something to flag x-factor ingredients would be beneficial.

The idea is basically that doctors recommend you keep a high protein diet while on the drugs because a calorie deficit without protein will lead to muscle wasting.

Based on my personal travels, the places with lots of fat people tend to have terrible food options more-easily available.

Causation probably flows both ways. In that case, fewer obese people means more produce and fewer packaged-snack aisles. We could enter a virtuous cycle where folks being choosier about their calories and resisting empty ones choose better-tasting and healthier fare.

Now how do you price that? The profits here will reward pharma investors and enable more investments in RnD of new medicines. I feel that's mostly fair.

Do you have any evidence of this? Your link doesn't confirm it.

Such insight! Of course that could be said about almost anything.

Don't know how accurate that is, though.

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."

You won't want to eat much, and if you do try to eat a full meal (if for example you went out to eat) you'll feel like crap for a few days.

But yes, otherwise it works as advertised.

What have you tried ?

Both of the two available GLP-1 have similar side effects, with Tirzepatide being lower at an equivalent effect dose. Their common side-effects are: Nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and indigestion. With rare serious side-effects being: Pancreatitis, allergic reaction. thyroid cancer, and acute kidney injury.

Generally speaking the common side-effects are dose-dependent. If you suffer too much, you back off the medication until the side-effects are at a level you can manage. This is common.

As a brief summary, it absolutely delivers what it says it does. I've lost weight as it claimed due to appetite suppression and feeling fuller longer. However, it's more complex than that, and the battle to ensure I get enough protein has been tough.

As confirmed by DEXA scans, I maintained my (very high) bone density and actually put on about 3lb of muscle over a 2-month period on low-dose retatrutide (3mg/wk) + tesamorelin (a GHRH peptide), while losing about 16lb of my most stubborn fat, including visceral fat that I hadn't been able to crack. I'm in my 40s, and my routine includes weight training, a high-protein diet, and Brazilian jiujitsu.

My approach is minimum effective dose as an amplifier to a good diet and active lifestyle, and it's been pretty damn effective.

In my case, I was just eating (read: drinking) too many calories, while not getting much exercise. Any small effort at a calorie deficit and moderate exercise makes the weight fall off.

By not taking it.

> Seems like GLP-1's are not a cure but treat the symptoms

This goes against all of the evidence around rebound, improved diet and exercise after folks have lost weight, et cetera.

There is always the risk of regaining weight unless you continue to do whatever caused you to lose weight (e.g. restricting calories) to some extent.

I guess a "cure" would be good but since we don't have one having to periodically go back on glp drugs if you gain weight is no different from periodically having to go on a diet if you gain weight.

On the other hand most people tend to naturally gain weight pretty slowly (e.g. a pound a year) so having to go on glp drugs for a period every few years wouldn't even be that bad, especially if they're available in pill form.

Just finding 10-12 hours in which to exercise every week is challenging on its own. It's much more difficult when the exercise itself becomes harder and less rewarding.