Weight loss tricks similar to Ozempic – 09/28/2024 – Balance

There is a long list of products that companies and influencers claim will provide rapid and dramatic weight loss, just like Ozempic. From gummies filled with fruit extract, green teas and even pots of oatmeal and rice soaked in lemon water, this new product comes in pill format and was launched by Lemme, Kourtney Kardashian’s supplement company.

Weight loss tricks have been around for decades. But they gained new life in the Ozempic era, chasing the success of pharmaceuticals and promising “natural” or “side effect-free” alternatives.

These Ozempic knockoffs, as they are called online, are now “a dime a dozen,” says Joe Schwarcz, director of the Office of Science and Society at McGill University in Canada.

But he and other experts still say there is no evidence to suggest that any of these products can match, or even come close to, the results patients get through prescription weight-loss medications.

“They take little pieces of scientific information and exaggerate it,” McGill says.

Ozempic has become so popular that much of the public is now much more familiar with the scientific language of weight loss, and many of these products have capitalized on this.

They use phrases like “metabolic health” and “gastric emptying” and often mention GLP-1, the gut hormone that helps you feel full and that medications like Ozempic mimic to suppress your appetite. Lemme’s new supplement is called GLP-1 Daily, and its website explains how it works in the body.

“I didn’t know what GLP-1 was until, like, my third year of medical school,” says Scott Hagan, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Washington who studies obesity. Using this kind of technical language, typically reserved for doctors and drug makers, can give these products a “scientific sheen,” says Adrienne Bitar, a lecturer in American studies at Cornell University who is the author of a book on diet culture.

“They are marketing a capsule as if it were a prescription drug that has been well studied and is well regulated,” explains Bitar. She noted that comments on Lemme’s Instagram posts advertising its GLP-1 line were already filled with questions about whether people could switch from a brand-name medication to supplements.

On its website, Lemme points to four studies that suggest some of its ingredients, including several plant extracts, can increase GLP-1 levels, suppress cravings and lead to a small amount of weight loss. But experts have warned that these tests are very small and only look at individual ingredients, not the pills themselves. “They’re not reliable studies,” says Pieter Cohen, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School who studies supplements.

Even though the pills promote the production of GLP-1, this alone does not necessarily mean significant or sustained weight loss — after all, eating also stimulates the hormone.

Cohen claims that no supplement currently on the market can lead to significant weight loss. “It simply doesn’t exist,” he adds. “If it existed, if it were also safe, it would be widely used and purchased.”

Doctors say they fear these supplements will find a wide audience, particularly among those who can’t access or afford brand-name medications, which can cost around $1,000 a month without insurance.

“I’m sure now my patients will come in and say, ‘I’m Kardashian-y,'” says Melanie Jay, director of the Langone Comprehensive Obesity Program at New York University.

This worries experts for several reasons. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) doesn’t check whether supplements are safe or effective before they hit the market, says Cohen. This means consumers have no guarantee that any pill they take works or that it contains what is advertised on the label, which many patients may not realize is a risk.

And these products can be expensive: a monthly supply of Lemme GLP-1 capsules is currently on sale for $72.

“You want to believe that things are easy and will help, and hey, maybe they won’t hurt,” says Jay. “But it’s bad if you’re living paycheck to paycheck, and now you’re spending $70 a month.”

_{This article originally appeared in The New York Times.}