With the explosive demand for breakthrough drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic for weight loss, pharmaceutical companies are racing to improve these medications and target additional conditions.
These drugs are classed as glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists, or GLP-1 RAs, the satiety hormone first developed to treat type 2 diabetes more than 20 years ago. It has a pronounced satiety effect, slowed down gastric emptying and delaying carbohydrate absorption. People eat less and are satisfied with smaller portions.
Now, between 900,000 and 1.4 million Canadians are currently using a GLP-1 drug to manage weight loss and diabetes, according to a December 2023
national survey from Dalhousie University’s Agri-Food Analytics Lab
in Halifax. The success of the drugs could also disrupt the food industry because cravings, especially among millennials taking the drug for weight loss, are reduced for impulse-buy snack foods like cookies and chips,
.
Both diabetes and obesity are flagged as growing public health crises in Canada and around the world that also increase the risk of heart disease, stroke and cancer, and pose a burden on healthcare services. In Canada, almost two-in-three adults and one-in-three children and youth are overweight or living with obesity with even higher rates in marginalized populations,
says the Public Health Agency of Canada
. And an estimated one in 10 Canadians aged 20 years and older has been
; nine in every 10 of those diagnosed have type 2 diabetes, where adopting healthy lifestyle habits can improve management and reduce the damage.