Yay for more generic meds to treat Type 2 Diabetes!
On the downside, doctors all over Canada are already being inundated by people with eating disorders who've been seeing ads for Ozempic/Wegovy/etc for a decade now, but couldn't justify the expense. To all my fellow 1990s "nothing feels as good as skinny tastes!" extreme dieting survivors - wishing you mental clarity and self care in these crazy days.
In the first 24 hours of generics coming online, Felix Health, a Canadian virtual care platform, had 14 times the number of people requesting a weight-loss visit with a doctor
Eating disorders and substance abuse are already very good buddies, and then there's the nausea, diarrhea, vomiting and constipation side effects both Ozempic users and extreme dieters are already so familiar with. So many diabetes researchers have given the heads-up about the self-image problems, drug dependency and mental side effects (like depression and suicidal ideation) prediabetes drug treatments seemed to exacerbate. But even in the early 2000s the topic was so dominated by lobbying and hyperbole their concerns couldn’t make a dent.
Today it’s a gazillion times worse. We've all seen posts about these drugs get smothered by all those culty ED buzzwords (like "food noise"), evangelical testimonials and thousands of updoots within hours. Then mainstream media reports What People Are Saying along with whatever the latest pharma-funded study says the new wonder drug can do, and it snowballs.
Lately I've noticed an uptick in online doctors Creating Content about how Ozempic MIGHT BE a great treatment for all your other addictions and bad thoughts too. Which makes the Ozempic user's story in the linked cbc article even more chilling imo:
[When she quit taking Ozempic] it was like a tap had been turned on in her head. Suddenly, all her thoughts the drug had suppressed about food and eating came flooding back. "It's relentless and it's constant," said the 50-year-old Powell River, B.C., resident.