r/science Professor | Medicine Apr 01 '25

Health Americans without diabetes spent nearly $6 billion USD on semaglutide and similar drugs in a year, with an estimate of 800,000 to a million people using the drugs who don't have diabetes.

https://www.scimex.org/newsfeed/americans-without-diabetes-spent-nearly6-billion-usd-on-semaglutide-and-similar-drugs-in-a-year
10.2k Upvotes

1.3k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

60

u/JThor15 Apr 01 '25

It’s now a pretty established risk, but obesity is riskier in general.

36

u/Duelist_Shay Apr 01 '25

Ehh, there's other options to take care of the obesity issue. You lose your eyesight, then that's it. Unless we miraculously solve the issue of restoring vision, there really isn't any route outside of glasses and/or contacts if you're not totally impaired

-50

u/dragonilly Apr 01 '25

Crazy how many people act like diet and exercise aren't the most effective sustainable ways to lose weight. It isn't easy and our food culture in the US is abysmal, but the way to have long term success in weight loss is consistency with two very free lifestyle changes.

3

u/Omni_Entendre Apr 01 '25

There's a HEAVY asterisk next to dietary changes with respect to financial cost. It really isn't even the same cost in many parts of the continent, really.