The family of a man who committed suicide after taking the weight loss drug Ozempic is blaming the medication for the tragedy.
Mr. Anthony, whose full name is not used due to privacy concerns, became uncharacteristically quiet around the time he began taking Ozempic in February to manage Type 2 diabetes, his sister Merlene Hall said in an interview with NBC. According to the family, Mr. Anthony seemed fatigued by early May, with his sullen mood getting worse.
When he committed suicide on May 14, his family members placed the blame on Ozempic. “I think the Ozempic was putting these suicidal thoughts in his mind,” Ms. Hall said.
Ms. Hall reported her brother’s death to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Novo Nordisk, the manufacturer of Ozempic, in June. She is not pursuing legal action.
Mr. Anthony’s family wants a black box warning from the FDA to be slapped on Ozempic, providing a warning about suicide risk. Black box warnings are only put in place when there are serious safety risks.
“I’m not trying to say that I believe this medicine is a bad medicine overall. I think that it probably offers a lot of benefits to a lot of people,” said Carolyn Hasty, Mr. Anthony’s fiancé in the interview.
“But I believe that there is a subpopulation out there, a portion of this population that they’re giving it to, that has to be more highly monitored and decide whether or not it’s a good drug for them.”
Wegovy—the same drug as Ozempic but sold under a different brand name—already carries a warning about suicidal thoughts. But, unlike Ozempic, it was approved for weight loss rather than Type 2 diabetes. FDA requires weight loss medications to carry such a warning.
Even though Ozempic is used for weight loss, the FDA has only approved the medication for Type 2 diabetes.
The official Ozempic website warns that the drug can cause “serious side effects,” including inflammation in the pancreas, low blood sugar, changes in vision, serious allergic reactions, kidney issues, and gallbladder problems.
It advised users to inform their healthcare provider in case they develop a lump or swelling in their neck, have trouble swallowing, or suffer shortness of breath, as these may be symptoms of thyroid cancer.
In an interview with The New York Times in April, Dr. Andrew Kraftson, a clinical associate professor in the division of metabolism, endocrinology, and diabetes at Michigan Medicine, said that some people who take Ozempic could end up experiencing a severe lack of appetite to the extent that they become malnourished.
Ozempic Weight Loss, Reaction
Both Ozempic and Wegovy contain the same active ingredient—semaglutide. A March 2021 study published in The New England Journal of Medicine found that using Ozempic can result in weight loss.The study concluded that 2.4 mg of semaglutide once weekly together with lifestyle intervention “was associated with sustained, clinically relevant reduction in body weight” among overweight and obese participants.
However, negative effects of such weight loss have also been identified. Health Canada, which is responsible for Canada’s national health policy, issued a warning in June that the use of Ozempic for weight loss “is not an approved indication.”
Using Ozempic to lose weight can cause “serious side effects,” including pancreatitis, severely low blood sugar levels, gallbladder issues, severe allergic reactions, thyroid tumors, and kidney problems, including kidney failure, it said.
In July, the European Medicines Agency said it was reviewing 150 cases of suicidal thoughts and self-injury among people who had taken GLP-1 receptor agonists, a class of medications that includes Wegovy and Ozempic.
The U.K.’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) also said that it was reviewing the safety of this drug class.
As of June 30, the FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS) has received 59 reports of suicidal ideation, six reports of attempted suicide, and four reports of suicide-related to Ozempic.
Regarding Mr. Anthony’s suicide, Kate Hanna, Director of Communications at Novo Nordisk, said in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times that the safety of patients is of “utmost importance” to the company and that they take adverse event reports “very seriously.”
“Our team is continuously monitoring the safety profile of our products and collaborating closely with health authorities to ensure patient safety information, including adequate information on side effects, are included in the product monograph,” she said.
“Safety data collected from large clinical trial programs and post-marketing surveillance have not demonstrated a causal association between semaglutide or liraglutide and suicidal and self-harming thoughts.”
Last year, U.S. sales of Ozempic contributed to 65 percent of Denmark-based Novo Nordisk’s global sales, with growth in the market expected to continue in the coming years.
The investor excitement over Ozempic and Wegovy has boosted Novo Nordisk shares, with the company becoming the largest firm by market cap in Europe this year, besting giants like Nestlé. Profits for the first half of 2023 rose by 43 percent to around $5.6 billion.
The popularity of Ozempic and Wegovy weight loss drugs comes as the United States is experiencing high rates of obesity.
The prevalence of obesity in the country rose from 30.5 percent to 41.9 percent between 2017 and March 2020, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
“The estimated annual medical cost of obesity in the United States was nearly $173 billion in 2019 dollars. Medical costs for adults who had obesity were $1,861 higher than medical costs for people with healthy weight,” the agency said.
