Experts have warned weight loss injections could be a ‘treatment for life’ unless changes are made
People who stop weight loss drugs could return to their original weight within a year(Image: Getty Images)
A diet expert has told weight loss jab users they risk ‘piling the weight back on’ after stopping injections.
New research has revealed that people on weight loss drugs like Wegovy and Mounjaro regain all the weight they have lost within a year of coming off the jabs.
The study by the University of Oxford found that patients typically lost 8kg on the medication, but returned to their original weight within 10 months of stopping them, the Guardian reports.
Study co-author Professor Susan Jebb, an expert in diet and population health at University of Oxford, said: “These drugs are very effective at helping you lose weight, but when you stop them, weight regain is much faster than [after stopping] diets.
“Is it going to be worth the NHS investing in these drugs if they only have them for a short time and then they pile all the weight back on, or does the NHS have to accept that these are going to be long term therapies?”
National guidance currently says people should not use weight loss injections for longer than two years.
Prof Jebb added: “Either people really have to accept this as a treatment for life, you’re going to have to keep going forever, or we in science need to think really, really hard, how to support people when they stop the drug.”
Weight loss drugs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro work by mimicking hormones that make you feel full(Image: PA)
Newer GLP-1 weight loss injections work by mimicking the action of hormones that make you feel full and are available either privately or on the NHS through specialist weight management services.
The study did not show that coming off weight loss medication caused weight gain, it simply highlighted a link. However, Prof Jebb says the effects seen are likely because the drugs curb hunger, and people taking them do not have to actively practice restraint to lose weight.
She said: “So when the drugs are then taken away, you haven’t got those sort of behavioural strategies in place that help keep the weight off.”
The study looked at nearly 6,400 adults in 11 studies of Weight loss injections. They found that those taking high-dose semaglutide and tirzepatide, more commonly known as Wegovy and Mounjaro, lost 16kg on average.
It showed that patients put on 9.6kg within a year, meaning weight loss jab users could expect to regain all 16kg again in just over 20 months after stopping the meds.
Research shows that those who stop weight loss medication regain weight ‘within a year'(Image: PA)
The research suggests that weight loss jab users may need to make lifestyle changes to ‘sustain healthier behaviour’ after coming off the drugs.
Jane Ogden, a professor of health psychology at Surrey University, said there was no point “just throwing people back out into the world of their own lives, carrying on their own behaviours from before” after coming off the jabs.
Prof Ogden said: “They’re going to need psychological counselling, behaviour change, nutritional support from that moment on to help them sustain healthier behaviour in the long term, to keep the weight off.
“The NHS should introduce a stepped care approach through online support available to large numbers of people at low cost, online or in-person group support or more intensive 1:1 support.”
The study was presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Malaga, Spain.
Tam Fry, chair of the National Obesity Forum, said the findings showed weight loss jabs were “not the quick fix which many users believe it to be”.
He added: “It shouldn’t surprise anyone if people regain weight having used GLP-1 drugs without seriously attempting to improve their lifestyle.”