Obesity in the U.S. Is Finally Declining. You Can (Probably) Thank Ozempic.
The medication shouldn't be this controversial.
If you're searching for stereotypes about Americans, you have a robust buffet to choose from. But the biggest, or one of the biggest, is that we are really, really fat.
It appears, however, that we are finally getting less fat. Between 2020 and 2023, obesity rates in the U.S. fell by about two percentage points—no small feat when considering the quick and relentless climb in prior decades.
We don't have enough information yet to say beyond a shadow of a doubt what the root of the turnaround is. But the signs point pretty strongly in one direction: drugs that assist with weight loss. Yes, the much-maligned Ozempic and related semaglutide medications, which induce satiety and have helped some conquer chronic obesity.
There are a few reasons to believe the connection here is solid. For starters, semaglutide prescriptions exploded within the period of declining obesity, spiking from 471,876 prescription fills in January 2021 to 2,555,308 in 2023. And as John Burn-Murdoch points out in The Financial Times, the receding obesity rates are seen more prominently among college graduates, who are more likely to use the drugs.
This is—objectively—a positive thing. It should mostly go without saying that chronic obesity is a crippling health issue that increases your chances of having a slew of adverse health complications: heightened risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, liver issues, gallbladder disease, joint issues, some cancers, sleep apnea, and on. It also makes a person's day-to-day more difficult in simple ways some might not consider. It's harder to move, harder to travel, harder to feel good about yourself.
And yet despite promising results, the use of semaglutide interventions for weight loss has been fraught with moral panic and controversy. There were the initial Ozempic shortages—a legitimate problem for type 2 diabetes patients, for whom the drug was originally developed. Those shortages have thankfully abated. The controversy has not.
That's because the real root of the skepticism and criticism, it seems, is that Ozempic is the easy way out of a problem that can be solved naturally with diet and exercise. Which, in an ideal world, sure. But losing weight can be a Herculean battle for some people. If the choices are between more people staying overweight or more people losing weight, the answer should be obvious. (And yes, people may experience some side effects, although I'd argue they likely pale in comparison to the side effects of being obese.)
"Americans are fat and getting fatter," wrote Reason's Ron Bailey in a March 2023 piece about obesity and the hope such weight loss drugs provide. A year and a half later, Americans are still fat, and Ozempic et al. are still amazing interventions for helping people get healthier.
But, as of right now, we're not getting fatter.
