Off the Scales: The Inside Story of Ozempic and the Race to Cure Obesity

This enlightening debut history of Ozempic and its societal impact from Reuters columnist Donnellan opens with one woman’s “exciting but also depressing” experience of receiving a promotion, multiple raises, and increased attention after losing 70 pounds on the drug. Donnellan then traces, against the backdrop of the growing obesity crisis, the “nearly four decades” of research that led to the groundbreaking discovery of GLP-1 and its development as a drug. The “gut hormone seemed to have magical properties for controlling blood sugar,” Donnellan writes, and kicked off a pharmaceutical arms race and “bitter competition” before its first appearance on the market in 2018. The author also shares poignant stories of ways the drug has transformed people’s lives for good or ill, from quieting a nagging obsession with food to giving one user life-altering gastric paralysis (she vomited “two hundred times per week”). Balancing these diverging experiences, as well as the numerous sociocultural issues the drug raises, such as its undermining of the body positivity movement and its inequitable distribution (“over $1,300 for a twenty-eight-day supply”), Donnellan cogently sizes up its future potential: GLP-1 could lead to a healthier population empowered to demand healthier foods and living conditions, or it could further expand the gulf between rich and poor. It makes for an astute, fair-minded primer on the drug. (Nov.)