Weight loss is an important health goal for Sabrazsia Gardner, so she began researching Wegovy, the anti-obesity drug that contains the same medication as Ozempic.
Gardner, 33, says she wanted to stop the snacking and binge eating that contributed to her obesity and eat less. But diets didn’t work, and she didn’t want to go the weight-loss surgery route.
The effectiveness and increasing popularity of drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic for weight loss are calling attention to the conundrum that Gardner and many others living with obesity face — when making lifestyle changes fails to lead to significant weight loss.
The idea that “(obesity) is a problem of willpower was really an oversimplification,” Dr. Tara Narula, cardiologist at Northwell Health in New York City, said on TODAY in a segment aired Aug. 15. She added that weight loss medications have shown many people, both researchers and patients, that genetics, hormones, environment, the brain and lifestyle choices all contribute to weight gain and loss.
“Lifestyle changes are always the hallmark of how we intervene first, and we teach people about how to eat healthy and also how to move and exercise, but for some people, it’s not enough,” she said.
Previous medications targeting obesity haven’t been “great,” Narula explained, so Wegovy and Ozempic are showing the potential of changing a person’s brain chemistry to impact their obesity.
For example, once Gardner started taking Wegovy in January 2023 after talking about all the options with her doctor, she noticed she had “very little appetite” and finally started losing weight.
“I don’t think about food the same. … I don’t think about snacking, and I’m fuller longer,” Gardner, an esthetician who lives in Chandler, Arizona, tells TODAY.com.
“I don’t even have hunger cravings. I eat because I’m supposed to. You eat to live, not live to eat.”
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