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January 8, 2026<\/p>\n
3 min read<\/p>\n
Add Us On Google<\/span>Add SciAm<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Weight and Health Benefits Vanish Fast after Quitting Weight-Loss Drugs, Study Finds<\/p>\n A new study finds that people who quit weight-loss medications, including GLP-1 drugs, regain weight four times faster than people who stop dieting or exercising<\/p>\n By Lauren J. Young edited by Claire Cameron<\/span><\/p>\n Tatsiana Volkava\/Getty Images<\/p>\n At this point, millions of people in the U.S. have tried at least one of a variety of glucagonlike peptide 1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist drugs such as Zepbound or Wegovy. For some, these medications have led to profound weight loss and often improvements in heart health. But many have ended up discontinuing the use of the drugs\u2014despite the fact that they have been touted as lifelong treatments. That raises the question: What happens to people\u2019s health after they stop taking these medications?<\/p>\n A new review study offers some clues to the answer. Research published on Wednesday in the BMJ found that people who stopped taking weight-loss drugs, including GLP-1 medications, are likely to see all the weight-loss and heart health benefits disappear in less than two years. The results also indicated that people who discontinue any kind of weight-loss medication regain the weight four times faster than those who stop dieting or working out to shed pounds.<\/p>\n \u201cWeight regain after a period of weight loss is really common, no matter what approach you take,\u201d says Sam West, lead author of the study and a research scientist at the University of Oxford, who specializes in integrated metabolism. \u201cThe fact that people regained weight after stopping medication wasn\u2019t too surprising, but what was striking is just how fast it occurred.\u201d<\/p>\n If you’re enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.<\/p>\n In addition to the newer GLP-1 drugs on the market, the study evaluated clinical trials on various weight-loss drugs, including older-generation GLP-1 medications and those outside of the class, such as orlistat and the combination of phentermine and topiramate. They compared the data on those treatments with a previous analysis on behavioral weight-loss interventions that included different dieting programs and exercise regimens.<\/p>\n People who took weight-loss drugs regained about a pound (0.4 kilogram) a month on average after they stopped treatment. All their cardiometabolic markers, including blood glucose levels, blood pressure and cholesterol, also reversed.<\/p>\n Ultimately, people may see weight return to its pretreatment level within 1.7 years of stopping the drugs and heart health markers return to their pretreatment state within 1.4 years, the study estimated. West says long-term data are needed to confirm these projections, however.<\/p>\n What these findings suggest is that, while weight-loss drugs lead to faster results than diet and exercise alone, quitting them also results in weight being regained much faster, regardless of how much was initially lost.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you look at the study\u2019s charts, which I thought were striking, you see that you might regain more weight and end up worse off than you were before,\u201d says Rozalina McCoy, an endocrinologist and internist at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, who was not involved in the study.<\/p>\n People who take a weight-loss medication lose fat, muscle and bone mass\u2014but they tend to mostly regain fat if they don\u2019t regularly exercise, McCoy says. \u201cEven if you end up at the same weight as you were before, metabolically, you are likely a lot less healthy,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n One possible strategy would be for people to go straight into a behavioral program, such as a diet or exercise regimen, as they came off the drugs. But that approach would need to be trialed and tested, McCoy says.<\/p>\n West says more assessments of people\u2019s weight and health reversals after they stop treatment conducted outside of the clinical trials would help researchers fully understand what\u2019s happening.<\/p>\n But the study \u201cis on par with what we see clinically\u201d in many people who stop GLP-1 medications, says Chika Anekwe, an obesity medicine physician at Massachusetts General Hospital Weight Center, who was not involved in the research.<\/p>\n \u201cIt goes back to the effects that the GLP-1 medications have on appetite control. And once that\u2019s gone, it\u2019s really difficult to maintain any sort of behaviors that were helping you to keep the weight off,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Treating obesity is not just a matter of willpower for some people, Anekwe says, and the results underscore what happens when a helpful weight-loss intervention is interrupted.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s a good reminder to insurance companies: when they change patients\u2019 coverage abruptly or limit access to the medications, it may have long-term effects,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n If you enjoyed this article, I\u2019d like to ask for your support. Scientific American<\/span> has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in that two-century history.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been a Scientific American<\/span> subscriber since I was 12 years old, and it helped shape the way I look at the world. SciAm <\/span>always educates and delights me, and inspires a sense of awe for our vast, beautiful universe. I hope it does that for you, too.<\/p>\n If you subscribe to Scientific American<\/span>, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.<\/p>\n In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can’t-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world’s best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.<\/p>\n There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you\u2019ll support us in that mission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" January 8, 2026 3 min read Add Us On GoogleAdd SciAm Weight and Health Benefits Vanish Fast after Quitting Weight-Loss Drugs, Study Finds A new study finds that people who quit weight-loss medications, including GLP-1 drugs, regain weight four times faster than people who stop dieting or exercising By Lauren J. Young edited by Claire<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[9639,542,2276,3602,188,1474],"class_list":{"0":"post-40909","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-clues","9":"tag-drugs","10":"tag-offers","11":"tag-quit","12":"tag-study","13":"tag-weightloss"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/40910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}On supporting science journalism<\/h2>\n
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