A large study of the medical records of more than 300 million people has found GLP-1 weight-loss and diabetes drugs increasingly prescribed to people with no apparent approved reason to take them, FoodNavigator reports. Of 92,415,648 US adults without an apparent FDA-approved indication, 1,133,953 were prescribed a GLP-1, and 35.1 per cent of them had a normal body mass index.
Such prescriptions rose from 0.11 per cent to 1.5 per cent between 2021 and 2025, a 13.6-fold increase, and were associated with lower social vulnerability and private insurance. The authors said the practice has grown rapidly among socioeconomically advantaged people, including those without obesity, and that "the risk-benefit profile in these populations remains uncertain."
Dr Nadia Ahmad, medical director of The Weight Care Clinic, said a French study suggests something similar may be happening in Europe, driven by social pressure and online discussion, while noting the data cannot show that every person lacked a medical reason. For someone taking the drug only to lose a little weight for appearance, she said, the benefit is less clear, but side effects such as nausea, vomiting and dehydration are still possible, and rarer problems such as pancreatitis must be taken seriously.
For Wegovy and Mounjaro the criteria are a BMI of 30 or more, or 27 to under 30 with weight-related health problems. Laura Wilson, director for Scotland at the Royal College of Pharmacy (as FoodNavigator names it), said the drugs play an important role for people living with obesity but should only be supplied after a robust clinical assessment. The report is by Lisa Buckingham.
Photo: HualinXMN / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Source: FoodNavigator
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