Obesity drug shows significant weight loss for at least four years, with fewer serious events, study finds
The largest and longest study of the obesity drug Wegovy has shown people maintain significant weight loss for at least four years, with fewer serious adverse events than those given placebo ‘dummy’ treatment.
Doctors say the finding will add pressure on UK health authorities, which currently limit treatment to just two years.
Results revealed at an international obesity conference show those given weekly injections of the drug shed pounds for the first 65 weeks of treatment, and then sustained a stable body weight over the longer term.
On average they lost 10.2% of their body weight and 7.7cm from their waist size after four years.
Significantly, even those who were only slightly obese, or who only lost a small amount of weight, still benefited from a reduction in cardiovascular risks, according to results presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Venice and published in the journal Nature Medicine.
Dr Simon Cork, senior lecturer in physiology at Anglia Ruskin University, who wasn’t involved in the study, said the results show for the first time that patients maintain a “weight plateau” if they continue treatment long term.
“Importantly one of the decisions by the UK health service to limit (treatment) to two years was because of questionable long-term cost effectiveness,” he said.
He added: “That this data demonstrates improved cardiovascular and metabolic parameters continuing to four years may go some way to negating that argument.
“This study also neatly demonstrates that obesity is a lifelong condition and the decision by NICE to limit prescription to two years does a disservice to patients suffering with obesity.”
A dosage of Wegovy, a drug used for weight loss. Pic: PA
The SELECT (Semaglutide and Cardiovascular Outcomes) trial involved 17,604 adults with obesity or who were overweight from 41 countries. None of them had diabetes, but all had previously had a heart attack, stroke or peripheral artery disease.
Over the first two years of the study, the proportion of people who were obese fell sharply from 71% to 43% in the group given Wegovy.
But in those given placebo injections, the rate dropped only slightly, from 72% to 68%.
After three years of treatment, participants had a 20% lower risk of a heart attack, stroke or dying from cardiovascular disease, according to analysis released last year.
Professor Donna Ryan from Pennington Biomedical Research Centre in New Orleans, USA, who led the study, said the weight loss was seen irrespective of age, gender and ethnicity.
“This degree of weight loss in such a large and diverse population suggests that it may be possible to impact the public health burden of multiple obesity-related illnesses,” she said.
“While our trial focused on cardiovascular events, many other chronic diseases including several types of cancer, osteoarthritis, and anxiety and depression would benefit from effective weight management.”
The study showed that serious adverse events were less common in those given the drug than those given placebo.
That was largely because people taking Wegovy were less likely to have cardiac disorders.
But people taking the drug were more likely to have gallbladder stones, and were more likely to stop taking treatment because of gastrointestinal problems such as nausea and diarrhoea.
A second analysis of the same group of patients, led by UK researchers, showed that cardiovascular benefits were seen even in patients who only had mild obesity or lost only modest amounts of weight.
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Professor John Deanfield, from University College London, said the finding had “important” clinical implications.
“Around half of the patients that I see in my cardiovascular practice have levels of weight equivalent to those in the SELECT trial and are likely to derive benefit from taking Semaglutide on top of their usual level of care.
“Our findings show that the magnitude of this treatment effect with semaglutide is independent of the amount of weight lost, suggesting that the drug has other actions which lower cardiovascular risk beyond reducing unhealthy body fat.
“These alternative mechanisms may include positive impacts on blood sugar, blood pressure, or inflammation, as well as direct effects on the heart muscle and blood vessels, or a combination of one or more of these.”
However, the researchers warn there isn’t yet evidence that treatment prevents major cardiovascular events.
Semaglutide, the active ingredient of Wegovy, is part of a growing class of GLP-1 drugs that make people feel full, reducing their calorie intake.
Zack Polanski and Nigel Farage might be polar opposites when it comes to politics – but they do have one thing in common.
The pair are both cutting through in a changing media landscape when attention is scarce and trust in mainstream politics is scarcer still.
For Farage, the Reform UK leader, momentum has been building since he won a seat at the general election last year and he continues to top the polls.
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Badenoch doesn’t want to talk about Farage
But in the six weeks since Polanski became leader of the Greens, membership has doubled, they’ve polled higher than ever before while three Labour councillors have defected. Has the insurgent firebrand finally met his match?
“I’m sure I don’t need to say this, but I despise Nigel Farage’s politics and disagree with him on almost everything,” Polanski tells Sky News.
“But I think his storytelling has undoubtedly cut through and so yes there has been a huge part of us saying ‘If Farage can do that with a politics of hate and division, then it’s time for the Green Party to do that with a politics of hope and community’ and that’s absolutely what I intend to keep doing.”
Polanski was speaking after a news conference to announce the defections of the councillors in Swindon – a bellwether area that is currently led by a Labour council and has two Labour MPs, but was previously controlled by the Tories.
It is the sort of story the party would previously have announced in a press release, but the self-described “eco populist” is determined to do things differently to grab attention.
He has done media interviews daily over the past few weeks, launched his own podcast and turbocharged the Greens social media content – producing slick viral videos such as his visit to Handsworth (the Birmingham neighbourhood where Robert Jenrick claimed he saw no white people).
Zack Polanski announces the defection of Labour councillors
Polanski insists that it is not increased exposure in and of itself that is attracting people to his party but his messaging – he wants to “make hope normal again”.
“I’m not going to be in a wetsuit or be parachuting from a helicopter”, he says in a swipe at Lib Dem leader Ed Davey.
“I think you only need to do stunts if you don’t have something really clear to say and then you need to grab attention.
“I think when you look at the challenges facing this country right now if you talk about taxing wealth and not work, if you talk about the mass inequality in our society and you talk about your solidarity with people living in poverty, with working-class communities, I think these are the things that people both want to hear, but also they want to know our solutions. The good news is I’ve got loads of solutions and the party has loads of solutions. “
Some of those solutions have come under criticism – Reform UK have attacked his policy to legalise drugs and abolish private landlords.
Discontent is fuelling the rise of challenger parties. Pic: PA
Polanski is confident he can win the fight. He says it helps that he talks “quite quickly because it means that I’m able to be bold but also have nuance”. And he is a London Assembly member not an MP, so he has time to be the party’s cheerleader rather than being bogged down with case work.
As for what’s next, the 42-year-old has alluded to conversations with Labour MPs about defections. He has not revealed who they are but today gave an idea of who he would welcome – naming Starmer critic Richard Burgon.
Like Burgon, Polanski believes Starmer “will be gone by May” and that the local elections for Labour “will be disastrous”.
He wants to replace Labour “right across England and Wales” when voters go to the polls, something Reform UK has also vowed to do.
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Is Zack Polanski squeezing the Labour vote?
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Luke Tryl, director of More in Common, says this reflects a “new axis of competition” as frontline British politics shifts from a battle of left vs right to a battle of process vs anti-establishment.
Farage has been the beneficiary of this battle so far but Tryl says Polanski is “coming up in focus groups” in a way his predecessors didn’t. “He is cutting through”, the pollster says.
However, one big challenge Polanski faces is whether his rise will cause the left vote to fragment and make it easier for Farage to win – something he has said he wants to avoid at all costs.
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And yet, asked if he would form a coalition with Labour to keep Farage out of power in the event of a hung parliament, he suggested he would only do so if Sir Keir Starmer is no longer prime minister.
“I have issues with Keir Starmer as prime minister,” he says. “I think he had the trust of the public, but I would say that’s been broken over and over again. If we had a different Labour prime minister that would be a different conversation about where their values are.”
He adds: “I do think stopping Nigel Farage has to be a huge mission for any progressive in this country, but the biggest way we can stop Nigel Farage is by people joining the Green Party right now; creating a real alternative to this Labour government, where we say we don’t have to compromise on our values.
“If people wanted to vote for Nigel Farage, they’d vote for Nigel Farage. What does Keir Starmer think he’s doing by offering politics that are similar but watered down? That’s not going to appeal to anyone, and I think that’s why they’re sinking in the polls.”
A former paratrooper accused of murdering two civilians in the Bloody Sunday shootings in Northern Ireland 53 years ago has been found not guilty.
Soldier F – who cannot be identified for legal reasons – was accused of killing James Wray and William McKinney during disorder after a civil rights parade on 30 January 1972 in Londonderry, also known as Derry.
The veteran was also found not guilty of five attempted murders at Belfast Crown Court on Thursday.
He had denied all seven charges.
Thirteen people were shot dead by the Parachute Regiment on the day in question.
Soldier F did not give evidence, but the court heard about previous statements from two paratroopers – known as G and H – who were in Glenfada Park North along with F.
The prosecution said their testimony was direct evidence that the defendant had opened fire in the area.
Bloody Sunday Trust undated handout photos of (top row, left to right) Patrick Doherty, Bernard McGuigan, John “Jackie” Duddy and Gerald Donaghey, (bottom row, left to right) Gerard McKinney, Jim Wray, William McKinney and John
However, the defence argued that they were unreliable witnesses as their statements were inconsistent with each other and with other witnesses who gave evidence.
The trial was held in Belfast in front of a judge, not a jury.
Delivering his judgment, Judge Patrick Lynch said the evidence presented against the veteran fell well short of what was needed for conviction.
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Two people have died and five others were taken to hospital following a fire in Glasgow.
Emergency crews were called to the blaze at a property in Hughenden Lane in Hyndland at about 10.20pm on Monday.
Police Scotland said a man and a woman were pronounced dead at the scene.
The force said their next of kin have been informed.
Five others were taken to hospital for the effects of smoke inhalation.
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A Police Scotland spokesperson said: “The fire is not believed to be suspicious, and no criminality has been established.”
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