{"id":2212,"date":"2023-07-10T07:00:28","date_gmt":"2023-07-10T01:30:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/escortsservice.com.au\/blog\/will-new-drugs-end-the-crisis\/"},"modified":"2023-07-10T07:00:28","modified_gmt":"2023-07-10T01:30:28","slug":"will-new-drugs-end-the-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/escortsservice.com.au\/blog\/will-new-drugs-end-the-crisis\/","title":{"rendered":"Will New Drugs End the Crisis?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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This is the second in a three-part series on the obesity crisis. Part one tackles a complicated question \u2013 why does the obesity rate keep rising despite our efforts to stop it? — <\/span><\/i>and can be found here<\/span><\/i><\/a>. Part three shows how doctors and patients can make treatment better and <\/span><\/i>can be found here<\/i><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

July 5, 2023 — In the mid-1980s, Louis Aronne strolled into a lab at Rockefeller University where a colleague was breeding mice. \u201cI will never forget what he showed me,\u201d said Aronne, now the director of obesity research and treatment at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City. \u201cHe had a cage with 10 mice, one severely obese and the others normal weight. He took blood from one of the thin mice and gave it to the fat mouse.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

When Aronne returned 3 days later, that obese mouse had turned thin.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It was proof of something Aronne already suspected: Obesity had biological causes and wasn\u2019t just a failure of willpower.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/section>\n

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Years later, in 1994, that research led to the discovery of leptin, a hormone released from fat cells that\u2019s involved in the regulation of body weight. It was a watershed moment in obesity research.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Since then, Aronne and others have worked to build the clinical field of obesity medicine, attempting to shift the public and medical view of obesity from a purely behavioral issue to a disease worthy of medical treatment.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

All the while, the U.S. obesity rate soared.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, another watershed moment: We finally have highly effective obesity drugs. The hype is real, and so are the weight loss results.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been saying for 30 years that when we find treatments that really work, people aren\u2019t going to believe the results,\u201d Aronne says. \u201cIt took longer than I expected, but it\u2019s gratifying now to see.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

All this excitement raises a crucial question: Will the new drugs finally end the obesity crisis? Experts have their doubts.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/section>\n

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The Big Question<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The emerging class of obesity medications known as GLP-1 agonists is indeed a game changer. The weight loss drug semaglutide (Ozempic, Wegovy) showed groundbreaking results, and studies suggest a parade of even more impressive drugs are on the way.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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Yes, the drugs offer new hope to millions with obesity complications. But to truly turn the tide on our 42% obesity rate, much more work remains to be done, researchers said, including answering a big question:<\/span><\/p>\n

How do these weight loss drugs work?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe have new blockbuster drugs, and we don\u2019t even know why they reduce body weight,\u201d says Samuel Klein, MD, professor of medicine and nutritional science at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. \u201cIt was by accident that this was discovered.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Oops, We Created a Weight Loss Drug<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Developed to treat diabetes, the GLP-1 drugs\u2019 weight loss effects were a surprise. Now that those effects are confirmed, pharmaceutical companies and researchers are racing to figure out how these drugs work.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/section>\n

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In the 1960s, scientists discovered the incretin effect \u2013 when you eat glucose (sugar), your body makes more insulin than it does if glucose is given intravenously. Glucose passes through the GI tract and the gut releases hormones that stimulate insulin secretion. It\u2019s \u201cessentially a feed-forward signal to your pancreas to tell it, ‘By the way, you need to be ready because there\u2019s a bunch of glucose coming,’\u201d said Randy Seeley, MD, director of the Michigan Nutrition Obesity Research Center, funded by the National Institutes of Health.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

One of these hormones — or \u201cincretins\u201d — is GLP-1. In experiments, people with type 2 diabetes who were hooked up to GLP-1 saw their blood sugar go down.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThat led to the idea that if we could take this native hormone and make it last longer, we\u2019d have a therapy for type 2 diabetes,\u201d said Seeley. Thanks to a GLP-1-like compound in the saliva of the Gila monster, that idea became reality in the 2000s.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/section>\n

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Along the way, a surprising side finding came to light: In early trials, diabetes patients on these drugs dropped weight.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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