Tony Zavaleta, 78, a professor at Texas Tech Southmost College, said something had changed during our dinner at a Mexican tavern on the Rio Grande border, since our previous encounters in 2019 and 2022. The septuagenarian Texan had swapped his usual burger and beer for a salad and unsweetened iced tea. “I don’t drink anymore. I don’t eat.”tells us. Then he makes a revelation: “I took Ozempic and went from 150 kilos to 120 kilos in two months. I haven’t been this size in years.” Ozempic is one of the miracle drug brands that are all the rage in the United States for weight loss.
Initially developed for diabetes patients like Tony Zavaleta, this remedy – whose active ingredient is semaglutide – is a formidable appetite suppressant. It is currently used to combat obesity. The whole of the United States is enamored with this category of drugs sold by the American pharmaceutical giants Eli Lilly and the Danish Novo Nordisk.
The product is hyped: Elon Musk took it in 2022 and no one believes Donald Trump’s former Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, who lost 40 kilos in just a few months and claims, like many Hollywood stars, that it is the result of a healthy diet and sports activities. Presenter Oprah Winfrey, a great promoter of Weight Watchers weight loss programs, lifted the taboo at the end of 2023, by confirming that she had undergone treatment. “The fact that there is an approved drug for weight control and staying healthier seems like a relief, a redemption, a gift, and not something to hide behind and be ridiculed. I’m sick and tired of the shame of others and of myself.”declared the star of the television sets.
A health disaster
Semaglutide offers great hope for combating the obesity epidemic that is ravaging the Midwest and the South of the United States. To combat this scourge, the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, on the shores of Lake Erie, has developed an entire specialized service. The figures, reported by surgeon Ricard Corcelles, are edifying: “Forty percent of Americans are obese, and 10 percent are severely obese. By 2030, the projections are for 50 percent and 25 percent, and there are 100 million diabetics and prediabetics in this country.”, explains. In short, a health disaster, which has been aggravated by the Covid-19 pandemic, due to junk food, immobility and even the increasing time spent in front of screens.
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