New questions about how Christina Aguilera lost weight were raised by the singer's appearance at the Dolce & Gabbana show in Italy during the last weekend of June. The 43-year-old singer appeared in a pink mini dress adorned with similarly coloured high boots.
"Buona notte," she wrote in the post of the first video she posted on Instagram
A few days later, she posted photos of her appearance at the famous designers' party. Aguilera's massive weight loss and transformation had fans and social media users speculating that she used Ozempic.
A few years ago, Christina has opened up about her own struggles with mental health, saying that she "would never want to relive" her twenties after a battle with anxiety and depression following childhood trauma left her struggling to keep up with the limelight. In the Hello magazine of October 2022 Xtina opened up about her struggles with body image in her 20s.
Ozempic, used to treat diabetes, keeps gaining attention as celebrities, a tech tycoon and social media influencers have described taking it to lose weight in short time frames.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the injectable medication for treating diabetes in 2017. In 2021, the agency approved a drug with a higher dose of the active ingredient in Ozempic, called liraglutide, to treat obesity under the brand name Wegovy.Since then, talk of the drug has popped up across the internet.
Ozempic and Wegovy are not the only medications gaining popularity for their weight loss effects. In November 2023, the FDA approved Zepbound, a new drug for weight management that contains the same compound as the diabetes medication Mounjaro. Similar drugs, including pill versions of the medications, are in the pipeline.
How it works
Ozempic and Wegovy are both designed to be injected once a week into the stomach, thigh, or arm. Semaglutide lowers blood sugar levels and regulates insulin, crucial for Type 2 diabetes patients. The drug also imitates a hormone called glucagon-like peptide-1 that we naturally produce in our intestines. It limits appetite by signalling to our bodies that we feel full and prompting our stomachs to empty more slowly. As a result, people with obesity and accompanying health concerns have lost weight by taking it.
What are the side effects?
People taking Ozempic for both FDA-approved and off-label use may experience nausea and dehydration. They might also feel fatigue and malaise. Their bowel movements might change, with some patients having diarrhoea and others becoming severely constipated.
Those who use these injections may have a higher risk of developing a rare form of blindness, a new study suggests. Still, doctors say it should not deter patients from using the medicines to treat diabetes or obesity.
Lack of ethics
Do doctors always know best? Although the medication was developed for use in patients with diabetes, celebrities and influencers flaunt dramatic weight loss with its off-label use. Unsurprisingly, physicians have often been easy in prescribing this seemingly ‘magical’ drug when faced with patients’ weight-gain concerns.
There are TikTok hashtags with millions of followers, endless column inches over celebrities’ waistlines and streams of media coverage when trial results come out. A new medicine rarely gets so much attention. Then again, it is even rarer that a licensed drug causes safe and rapid weight loss with minimal effort.
Patients have expressed frustration with doctors who prescribe Ozempic for weight loss despite their adamant refusals. Some doctors are even accused of prescribing the medication when medical testing shows that their patient’s health is not in jeopardy.
Shortage
Another "side effect" is that we see shortages worldwide causing health concerns as users flood social media with posts hailing its properties as a "wonder" weight loss product.
France's drug safety agency said in March this year that it was building up surveillance measures to ensure that prescriptions of the treatment, Ozempic, are limited to patients with type 2 diabetes.
Global pandemic?
There are tangible benefits to treating and preventing obesity for our public health services. The disease costs healthcare systems billions a year to treat its consequences. Saving money by driving down the costs of obesity through medications is worthwhile. However the savings will not be immediate, and the costs of putting hundreds of millions of people on injectable drugs are incalculable for the time being.
Nevertheless, beyond costs are many other complicated questions: What will be the consequences of using injectables for many years? What are the risks for children? How long will efficacy continue? What are the dangers of long-term use?
Picture: Instagram @xtina / Pinktina by D&G
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