{"id":162819,"date":"2025-06-06T11:33:14","date_gmt":"2025-06-06T11:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/162819\/"},"modified":"2025-06-06T11:33:14","modified_gmt":"2025-06-06T11:33:14","slug":"ozempic-linked-to-terrifying-eye-bleeding-disorder-that-turns-patients-blind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/162819\/","title":{"rendered":"Ozempic linked to terrifying eye-bleeding disorder that turns patients blind"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ozempic has been linked to a potentially blinding condition that causes internal bleeding behind the eyes.<\/p>\n

An\u00a0Israeli<\/a> study found patients taking Ozempic or similar weight-loss shots were twice as likely to suffer from a serious degenerative eye disease compared to those not on the medication.<\/p>\n

The condition, neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD), causes leaky blood vessels to grow behind the eye, which can spill fluid into the retina \u2014 leading to permanent damage and blindness.<\/p>\n

Ozempic and similar medications work by mimicking the body’s naturally occurring GLP-1 hormone, which reduces hunger.<\/p>\n

And while the exact link between weight-loss drugs and vision problems isn’t known, scientists believe they bind to GLP-1 receptors in the eye, triggering the growth of the blood vessels.<\/p>\n

Although cases were rare, experts warned over the concerning signal in the data \u2014 saying that further research was needed.<\/p>\n

It is at least the second eye condition to be linked to the drug, after scientists also found a potential link<\/a> to non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION) \u2014 a condition where the optic nerve is damaged, causing blindness.<\/p>\n

And comes just days after the drug was linked to a higher risk of kidney cancer<\/a>, although researchers said it lowers the risk of other forms of cancer.<\/p>\n

\"After \"However, <\/p>\n

After being resigned to being obese, Brad Roberts couldn’t believe it when he lost 24lbs in a month on weight loss drugs.\u00a0However, in a shocking turn of events, the 44-year-old father-of-four and his wife Stacey are suing the doctor who prescribed him the weight loss drugs<\/p>\n

About one in eight Americans have already tried a GLP-1 like Ozempic, surveys suggest, while around 15million \u2014 or 6 percent \u2014 are thought to be currently on the medications.<\/p>\n

Age-related macular degeneration affects about 19million adults in the US, estimates suggest, with older adults being most commonly affected.<\/p>\n

Of these, about 1.5million have the late stage form, with nAMD behind around 10 percent of these cases \u2014 according to the non-profit Bright Focus<\/a>. It says that 90 percent of patients diagnosed with nAMD are considered legally blind.<\/p>\n

In the condition, new, abnormal and fragile blood vessels grow on the macula \u2014 an area in the center of the eye behind central, high-resolution, color vision \u2014 and may then leak blood and fluid onto it, causing damage and loss of vision.<\/p>\n

While it isn’t clear exactly what causes the condition, the American Academy of Ophthalmology suggests that it could be due to shifts in hormones in the eye sparking the growth of more blood vessels.<\/p>\n

For the study, published in\u00a0JAMA Opthalmology<\/a>, scientists extracted data on 139,000 adults in Ontario, Canada, from the ICES database \u2014 which collects data on patients in the province from public sources.<\/p>\n

All of the patients had type 2 diabetes, and they were 66 years old on average. Some 46 percent were female.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Around 46,000 were prescribed a weight loss drug like Ozempic for at least six months \u2014 while the rest took different diabetes drugs.<\/p>\n

Over three years, researchers recorded 93 cases of nAMD in the weight loss drug group (or 0.2 percent of patients).<\/p>\n

But in the group not using the drug, there were 88 cases (or 0.1 percent of patients).<\/p>\n

\"Real <\/p>\n

Real Housewives of New Jersey star Dolores Catania admitted to using Ozempic to lose weight for the six weeks ahead of the RHNJ reunion. There is no evidence that she lost any vision due to the drug<\/p>\n

\"Todd <\/p>\n

Todd Engel pictured above with his wife Shelley. He has lost vision in both his eyes after taking the weight loss and type 2 diabetes medication Ozempic<\/p>\n

The researchers said: ‘An explanation for the increasing risk with prolonged exposure is that the retina contains receptors for GLP-1, and [these] are known to\u00a0increase the levels of CXCL12.’<\/p>\n

The researchers said CXCL12 is a substance that attracts white blood cells, with this possibly causing the growth of new blood vessels.<\/p>\n

Out of the patients, 97 percent were reported to be on a semaglutide \u2014 which includes semaglutide \u2014 while the rest were on lixisenatide \u2014 brand name Adlyxin.<\/p>\n

Your browser does not support iframes.<\/p>\n

Scientists started tracking the individuals between January 2020 and November 2023 for up to three years on average.<\/p>\n

Ozempic’s maker Novo Nordisk is already facing several lawsuits from people who say that the drug robbed them of their sight \u2014 including Todd Engel, a 62-year-old type 2 diabetic who lost vision in his right eye just four months after he started using the shots.<\/p>\n

At the time, his doctors had no clue the jabs could be linked to it, and dismissed it as a coincidence \u2014 leading him to continue to use them. Six months later, he also lost vision in his left eye.<\/p>\n

Doctors say the damage is permanent and that Engle will never see again \u2014\u00a0 with the most he can perceive being faint pinpricks of light.<\/p>\n

He was diagnosed with nonarteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy, or NAION, a rare condition that cuts off blood flow to the optic nerve and causes permanent vision loss.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Todd <\/p>\n

Todd Engel is pictured above with the grandchildren and one of his children while on a family outing<\/p>\n

Now blind in both eyes, the 62-year-old has been forced to give up his job as a motor equipment operator.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At home, his family has installed special push-button controls for the microwave and television \u2014 devices he can no longer see, but can still hear.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

He says he was never warned of the potential risk \u2014 and believes he would have reconsidered the drug had he known the danger.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Engel had lived with type 2 diabetes for more than 25 years, and had been taking medication to manage it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His lawyers say he had no history of eye problems, and routinely passed the annual vision tests required for his job.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Engel\u2019s Attorney Ashley Hornstein, from the law firm Motley Rice, told the Daily Mail: \u2018The tragic thing about this case is that he had no idea this was even a possibility with the drug.<\/p>\n

‘He stayed on Ozempic for another five or six months after the vision loss happened the first time.<\/p>\n

‘If he hadn’t, it’s quite likely that he would still have vision in one eye today \u2014 that is all part of this horrific tragedy.’\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ozempic has been linked to a potentially blinding condition that causes internal bleeding behind the eyes. An\u00a0Israeli study…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":162820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[943,92,105,370,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-162819","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-canada","9":"tag-dailymail","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-ozempic","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114636207299959802","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=162819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/162820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=162819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=162819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=162819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}