Weight-loss jabs helped us when all else failed | Obesity
Regarding the article of Dr. Helen Salisbury (as GP of the NHS, I can now prescribe jabs of weight loss – but a quick solution for obesity is not what we need, June 26), I had a body mass index of almost 50 before starting Mounjaro Privé, even if I ate and exercised more frequently than many of my peers. I could also have written several books on nutrition. I did not get to this size because some bullet idiots eaten continuously, but had a frenzy disorder linked to episodes of poor mental health that no health professional was interested in discussing until I lost weight.
Health care for people with obesity in the United Kingdom are appalling. You cannot approach a general practitioner on anything without it being linked to your weight and you said that you just need to eat less and move more, but we wonder why a large number of obese people suffer from malnutrition.
At one point, my general practitioner advised me to cut my daily calorie intake, 1,500, in me, which lets me try to manage 750 per day. Weight loss drugs have changed my life as I feel in control for the first time, and I lost slowly and appropriately three stones by using them.
Rebecca Nottingham
Grimsby, Lincolnshire
I have a private prescription for Mounjaro since March 2023 and I lost 43 kg, 30% of my original weight, with my body mass index going from 42 to 29. I appreciate that, at a level of society, it is more necessary than it was revolutionary for me. I followed the nutrition and exercise advice, and I was very lucky by not having side effects.
I appreciate the point of Dr. Helen Salisbury: that has not changed my underlying approach to food, and to avoid regaining all the weight, I will have to manage it very carefully when I reach my target weight and stop the drugs. However, I do not think there is another feasible way to reach this weight loss. Rather than avoiding medication, as the article suggests, priority must surely be the change in behavior and support in the next step?
Andy Taylor
London
Far from solving the problem of obesity, drugs tend to worsen things, because those who receive them will tend to consider them as a substitute for a healthy diet combined with exercise. Sugar was very seriously rationed during the Second World War and its consequences, and “fast food” had not been invented. My primary school in the village state had two asphalt play areas, as well as a large field. My secondary school was even better equipped and we were taken to the local council bathing baths (now closed) twice a week. These are advantages for life: I celebrated my 80th birthday by swimming 1,000 meters.
What is necessary is a campaign similar to the anti-tabac campaign coupled with the re-institution of play and swimming areas. It will take time and money, but will be more than self -financing, as health benefits will accumulate almost immediately and the savings for the NHS will increase exponentially. Type 2 diabetes is a avoidable disease, but has already reached epidemic proportions, with heart problems and poor circulation resulting in infections and amputations. There will undoubtedly be the usual outcry of self-stable “freedom” organizations funded by the food lobby. These, like the Pro-Fumeurs hall, must be ignored.
Michael E Corby
London
