Weight-loss drugs cannot rescue the UK from its deepening obesity crisis and produce unpleasant side-effects for many users, the government’s chief medical adviser has said.
Prof Chris Whitty delivered a wide-ranging critique of the drugs during a speech in London on Thursday evening.
“Just relying on the drugs seems to me the wrong answer,” he said.
Prof Chris Whitty, Photograph: Kirsty O’Connor/PA
His scepticism about drugs such as Mounjaro and Wegovy, known as GLP-1 agonists, contrasted with the health secretary, Wes Streeting, who has hailed them as a “real gamechanger” in tackling obesity.
Giving the annual Medical Journalists’ Association lecture, Whitty cautioned against relying too much on the drugs to treat obesity. Tougher action to curb junk food advertising and make food healthier to prevent obesity occurring would be a better course of action to take, he said.
“Does anyone in this group believe that the correct answer is to allow obesity to rise because of pretty aggressive marketing of obesogenic foods to children and them stick them on GLP-1 agonists at the age of 18? I think it is shocking if that is where we end up.
“Really, is our answer to say ‘give up on public health’, which we know will work, in children and then just rely on drugs to get us out of a hole? I do not think this is a socially acceptable answer. Actually, I do not think that’s a medically acceptable answer, because these drugs are not benign,” Whitty said.
“GLP-1s, they are very good drugs. [But] we know that if you stop them, the weight comes on again. Some people have very bad reactions to them. It’s very small numbers, but they do. And a large number of people have unpleasant side-effects, largely gastrointestinal,” he added.
GLP-1s, sometimes called “fat jabs”, have been shown to increase the risk of complications such as severe acute pancreatitis, sudden sight loss and unexpected pregnancy among women using contraception.
With weight regain common after coming off GLP-1s, they could also mean that people end up in older age with less muscle mass and more fat than before they began taking them, he added.
Decades of policy in the UK to halt the rise in obesity has failed, in contrast to the success of other countries at doing so, but their achievements show it can be done, Whitty said. He added he was “really worried” that obesity was worsening, unlike campaigns to prevent smoking and air pollution.
“In obesity, things are going the wrong way. They don’t have to. In France, for example, levels of obesity are pretty well the same now as they were in 1990. No one can claim the French don’t like their food,” he said.
Asked if ministers should encourage or force food firms to make their products healthier, Whitty said that “reformulation definitely has a part to play in this” and urged them to put less sugar and fat in their products.
Industries that would face tough action to improve public health use “very strong lobbyists” to persuade the media to run stories that then deter ministers from taking the bold steps needed, he added. The media then depict policies which would be beneficial as “nanny state”, even though most voters want action taken.
Obesity experts welcomed Whitty’s remarks.
Sonia Pombo, the head of research and impact at Action on Salt and Sugar, said: “Weight-loss drugs are not, and must never be treated as, a substitute for a strong, effective food policy. Depending on GLP-1s to counter the harms of an unhealthy food environment is simply putting a plaster on a system that continues to generate ill health.”
Katharine Jenner, the director of the Obesity Health Alliance, said: “It is not a commonsense approach for the government to continue to let children grow up in environments flooded with unhealthy options, only to rely on medicines later in life to address the harm. We should not accept a system where the food industry drives obesity and the pharmaceutical industry is left to pick up the pieces.
“Childhood obesity is preventable. Stronger action, from reformulating food and restricting junk food advertising aimed at children to setting targets for companies to reduce sales of unhealthy processed products, can help create healthier environments and better outcomes. The UK should be guided by the evidence and act far more boldly to prevent obesity before it starts.”
