08/08/2025
We are witnessing a revolution: GLP-1 drugs (like Ozempic, Wegovy, and related semaglutides) are storming the markets, generating over $40 billion in annual sales for Novo Nordisk alone in 2024, with the broader GLP-1 market projected to exceed $50 billion by 2025 as demand surges. This has moved food company stocks downward—think snack giants like Mondelez and Hershey seeing dips amid shifting consumer habits—creating an economic and cultural force.
Another striking feature of these drugs is their ability to reduce risks and mortality from diseases not directly tied to diabetes or obesity (their primary indications). The effects are measurable but modest—around 20-30% risk reduction in cardiovascular events, for instance, which might translate to a few extra years under the Gompertz law of mortality. This isn't entirely surprising, as early diabetes can rob 6-8 years of life, so controlling it could extend lifespan. Remember the promise of the TAME trial? It's the ambitious idea of testing metformin against aging in a massive Phase III-like study, hinting at broader longevity potential.
In a way, GLP-1 drugs have fulfilled the geroscience dream for the first time in a practical sense: creating a medication that hits levers behind multiple age-related diseases at once, from heart disease to potentially neurodegeneration.
As the dust settles, interesting questions pop up. Developing GLP-1 drugs was hard but didn't require alien-level tech. The more people reflect, the more comments surface suggesting that one of the biggest barriers was cultural: to many, obesity was a choice rather than a disease. This perception, fueled by stigma and misconceptions, led to hurdles like delayed regulatory approvals (regulators were cautious, imposing stricter criteria and slower pathways, as seen with Ozempic's initial diabetes-only approval before weight loss extensions), limited insurance coverage (insurers often denied claims for weight loss use, viewing it as non-essential despite the medical necessity), and slowed research and development (pharma investments lagged due to the 'personal failing' narrative, reducing incentives for new treatments).
That apparently slowed development—potentially by years or even decades, as obesity wasn't formally recognized as a disease by bodies like the American Medical Association until 2013, which finally spurred more focused R&D and approvals. Does this sound familiar?
It may be: look at drug discovery against aging—same issues here. Aging isn't classified as a disease by regulators like the FDA, so longevity biotech companies often pivot to targeting specific age-related diseases (including metabolic health, of course!) to get funding and approvals.
Meanwhile, the wellness industry is on the rise. Influencers and activists, many of them young, coach people to "stay young" by sleeping well, dieting, and exercising—this is the same old "aging is a choice" narrative
This "aging as a choice" narrative is further supported by the takeover of healthspan vs. lifespan discourse. We don't need to live longer, they say; let's just stay healthier for the same span and die with almost no medical costs, as responsible citizens and system users.
These are all very dangerous narratives that showed their harm already with the obesity pandemic. Now, as we're bracing for personal old-age stories and the silver tsunami of an aging population as a society, we must learn to recognize such bad narratives and fight them.
Learn this by heart and invoke it as a prayer when reading wellness papers and excerpting media pieces:
* Aging is not a choice, but is currently a thermodynamic inevitability.
* Aging is not a bunch of diseases; it's progressive functional decline causing diseases.
* People of advanced age (90+) have fewer diseases than their deceased friends, and yet, they are functional shadows of their younger selves. Aging sucks.
* No amount of diet, supplements, or drugs against specific age-related diseases will stop that.
As with GLP-1 drugs, victory over aging isn't just a matter of technology and science; it's also a struggle in the realm of narratives and memes. Please like and repost to help the good memes win over the bad!
