This is the Weight and Healthcare newsletter! If you like what you are reading, please consider subscribing and/or sharing! Zepbound (one of the brand names for Tirzepatide) is a newly approved “weight loss medication” (more on that in a moment) delivered by weekly injection. Today we’ll talk about the basics of the drug, and over the next two parts we’ll do a deep dive into the latest research.
Holy moly, this is hard to read… our fatness is so offensive to these companies that they’re comfortable inflicting cancer risk on us. On us, a population with worse cancer outcomes because we aren’t taken seriously and aren’t given evidence-based healthcare.
We are so disposable to these drug companies. Fatness is so prevalent that they don’t even care if they kill off their paying customers because there’s just so many of us, and the medical model of anti fatness means our actual medically necessary care can be held hostage unless/until we agree to drugs that can cause thyroid cancer, make our birth control less effective (in a post-Roe world!), give us GERD (which is not as benign as we’re expected to believe), and encourage malnutrition.
Thanks for talking about this, Ragen. Important stuff.
I find it scary how the FDA not only approved it for weight loss but approved it at all. The FDA should understand how the body and metabolic diseases work before approving shit.
This is terrifying! No, just no, greedy drug companies and shareholders. Go fuck right off. Better yet, they can try it first for about 8-10 years and let us know how it's going. Same with the FDA-shameful!!
Thanks for this research and information, Ragen! ❤️
is it just me or am i missing something? but isn't this way of titrating the dose of what is normally done? ie. use the lowest possible and minimize the side effects. maybe it isn't a good analogy but i have never been encouraged to up my dose of pain killers to maximize the relief and tolerate more delibitating side effects. Which frankly would offset any slight decrease in pain.
I think you've got it! Typically medications are dosed based on a balance between achieving the treatment goal and minimizing side effects. The issue here is that the goal of titration for these weight loss drugs is to maximize a side effect (thus maximizing all dose-dependent side effects.) So it would be more like if pain medication had a side effect of weight loss, so they gave it to people who weren't experiencing pain, and encouraged them to take the maximum dose that they can stand (often more than is typically prescribed for people who use the drug to control pain.)
Hi Ragen, you're doing amazing work here! Just wanted to say hello and mention that I'm trying to get men more involved in the fat activism space and in these conversations. Please stop by my little corner of the Substack universe: https://yourfatguyfriend.substack.com/
Ragen, it appears you are ideologically opposed to weight loss medications in general, irregardless of safety or efficacy profile, is that an accurate statement? In other words, if it turns out with further research that these medications are reasonably safe, would it change your opinion on them?
I do not think that the science supports a weight-centric paradigm wherein weight loss is seen as a healthcare intervention worth any risk to the health, life, and/or quality of life of higher-weight people. I cover that more in these posts it it's helpful:
There is no such thing as a safe drug, even aspren can be dangerous if used to much.
Furthermore every single weight loss drug is just repurposed from something else in which weight loss is a side effect; even if the medicine was originally taken off the market because of safety concerns.
Also making someone sicker should never be justified.
Holy moly, this is hard to read… our fatness is so offensive to these companies that they’re comfortable inflicting cancer risk on us. On us, a population with worse cancer outcomes because we aren’t taken seriously and aren’t given evidence-based healthcare.
We are so disposable to these drug companies. Fatness is so prevalent that they don’t even care if they kill off their paying customers because there’s just so many of us, and the medical model of anti fatness means our actual medically necessary care can be held hostage unless/until we agree to drugs that can cause thyroid cancer, make our birth control less effective (in a post-Roe world!), give us GERD (which is not as benign as we’re expected to believe), and encourage malnutrition.
Thanks for talking about this, Ragen. Important stuff.
MEMO TO THE DRUG COMPANIES AND KAISER PHYSICIANS: No, I am not available for pharmacological experimentation.
Thanks for the very clear breakdown, Ragen! A lot to think about.
Disgraceful 😔
My sister takes mounjaro for her diebetes.
I find it scary how the FDA not only approved it for weight loss but approved it at all. The FDA should understand how the body and metabolic diseases work before approving shit.
This is terrifying! No, just no, greedy drug companies and shareholders. Go fuck right off. Better yet, they can try it first for about 8-10 years and let us know how it's going. Same with the FDA-shameful!!
Thanks for this research and information, Ragen! ❤️
thaks for the clear explanation.
is it just me or am i missing something? but isn't this way of titrating the dose of what is normally done? ie. use the lowest possible and minimize the side effects. maybe it isn't a good analogy but i have never been encouraged to up my dose of pain killers to maximize the relief and tolerate more delibitating side effects. Which frankly would offset any slight decrease in pain.
I think you've got it! Typically medications are dosed based on a balance between achieving the treatment goal and minimizing side effects. The issue here is that the goal of titration for these weight loss drugs is to maximize a side effect (thus maximizing all dose-dependent side effects.) So it would be more like if pain medication had a side effect of weight loss, so they gave it to people who weren't experiencing pain, and encouraged them to take the maximum dose that they can stand (often more than is typically prescribed for people who use the drug to control pain.)
Hi Ragen, you're doing amazing work here! Just wanted to say hello and mention that I'm trying to get men more involved in the fat activism space and in these conversations. Please stop by my little corner of the Substack universe: https://yourfatguyfriend.substack.com/
Sorry to be late to the party on this, thanks for the work that you are doing!
Your work is amazing. Thank you!
Ragen, it appears you are ideologically opposed to weight loss medications in general, irregardless of safety or efficacy profile, is that an accurate statement? In other words, if it turns out with further research that these medications are reasonably safe, would it change your opinion on them?
I do not think that the science supports a weight-centric paradigm wherein weight loss is seen as a healthcare intervention worth any risk to the health, life, and/or quality of life of higher-weight people. I cover that more in these posts it it's helpful:
https://weightandhealthcare.substack.com/p/three-things-that-should-be-required
https://weightandhealthcare.substack.com/p/quick-guide-to-evaluating-weight
https://weightandhealthcare.substack.com/p/the-research-post
There is no such thing as a safe drug, even aspren can be dangerous if used to much.
Furthermore every single weight loss drug is just repurposed from something else in which weight loss is a side effect; even if the medicine was originally taken off the market because of safety concerns.
Also making someone sicker should never be justified.
1. Irregardless is repetitively repetitious.
2. Name one safe weight loss drug-ever. Speed? Phen Phen?
3. It's not a question of ideology per se when there is no such thing as a safe weight loss drug.
4. Weight loss as a concept is not healthy.