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The story
On November 9, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced it is now requiring manufacturers of GLP-1 drugs used to treat obesity and diabetes, such as Wegovy and Mounjaro, to add a warning to their labeling about the risk of “non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION)” — a condition in which blood flow to the optic nerve is cut off, potentially causing blindness. In the thread, some said the risk was acceptable when weighed against other health risks for people using the drugs to treat diabetes, while others questioned whether the same warning should apply to people misusing them as “weight-loss pills” outside their approved use. Many pushed back by citing data showing the condition affects only a few people per 100,000, arguing the risk of blindness from diabetes itself is far greater.
US FDA mandates “risk of vision loss” warning for Wegovy and Mounjaro
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has mandated that GLP-1 (glucagon-like peptide-1) obesity and diabetes drugs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro carry a warning about the “risk of vision loss.”
On the 9th (local time), the FDA announced it is requiring all manufacturers of GLP-1 drugs to add information to drug labeling about the increased risk of “non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION),” a condition in which blood supply to the optic nerve is cut off, damaging optic nerve cells. GLP-1 drugs mimic the body’s own GLP-1 hormone, lowering blood sugar and suppressing appetite.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
This "Wegovy" thing?
That one actually came out first worldwide.
In Japan, the main ones are:
• Ozempic • Trulicity • Mounjaro • Victoza • Rybelsus
• Ozempic (generic: semaglutide)
• Trulicity (generic: dulaglutide)
• Mounjaro (generic: tirzepatide / GIP/GLP-1 receptor agonist)
• Once-daily subcutaneous injection
• Victoza (generic: liraglutide)
• Once-daily oral pill
• Rybelsus
Isn't Date using Zepbound rather than Mounjaro? (Zepbound is the same drug, tirzepatide, just marketed for weight loss instead of diabetes)
Just wear glasses. Non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy is rare anyway, and staying obese carries a much bigger risk of dying — sometimes you have to pick the lesser evil.
Unless you're seriously obese, being thin is actually the bigger health risk.
There are reports that over 5% of users of both Wegovy and Mounjaro experience accelerated hair loss.
All you do is complain — you don't even have the knowledge to teach anyone how to actually lose weight.
Because they want to take the easiest route possible.
Why do you assume it's only women?
Diabetes itself already carries a blindness risk lol
Wegovy is actually an obesity drug, you know.
I got diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, take medication, and made walking a habit on nice days, but my metabolism went up and food tastes so good I haven't lost much weight… though my walking range has easily expanded to where I can walk to the next town over or stroll around wherever I go.
Exercise barely matters for weight loss — it's almost all about diet.
It's approved as a diabetes treatment, but I don't think it's approved as a weight-loss drug.
Diabetes itself can cause blindness too, so this is just risk-hedging. The real problem is shady doctors prescribing it to people who aren't even diabetic — but you guys are against punishing that kind of thing, aren't you?
Mounjaro's vision-loss risk is about 2 to 10 people per 100,000.
I looked it up — Mounjaro's retinopathy risk is 0.04%, which according to the data is actually lower than the 0.1% risk of pancreatitis. By the way, Mounjaro isn't a weight-loss drug — it's just a drug people mistake for one.
Correction: that 0.04% is the proportion of NAION diagnoses among 10,000 combined users of semaglutide and tirzepatide. That works out to 4 in 10,000 — far lower than the 25-30% of diabetic patients who develop some form of retinopathy.
It's a diabetes treatment drug, so they should just restrict prescriptions to people who are diabetic (or pre-diabetic) with a BMI of 30 or higher.
That's probably where this is headed anyway.
I'm planning on becoming handsome, though?
That's true when you're young, but once you're older, losing weight makes your face look gaunt — it's shocking.
It's a necessary drug for people who actually have diabetes — it just makes no sense for "people who don't" to be using it.
Diabetic patients already face blindness from diabetes itself (in 3-5% of all patients), so Mounjaro is arguably still the lesser risk.
Didn't you think the same thing about the COVID vaccine?
Background and key points of this discussion
GLP-1 drugs were originally developed as diabetes treatments to lower blood sugar, but their appetite-suppressing effect has recently drawn attention to them as “weight-loss drugs.” What the FDA has now mandated is a warning label for “non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION),” a condition caused by interrupted blood flow to the optic nerve; even by the data cited in the thread, the incidence is only a few people per 10,000 — fairly small compared to the risk of retinopathy from diabetes itself (affecting roughly 3-5% of patients). Where the thread split was over how to weigh this risk: some saw it as “worth it” for people who need the drugs to treat diabetes, when compared against other health risks, while others questioned whether people using them off-label as “weight-loss drugs” should be exposed to the same risk. One point readers can easily misunderstand is that this measure is not a sales suspension or usage ban — it simply mandates an added warning on the package insert, and does not represent any change in the drug’s overall safety assessment.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (News Speed+) thread “Vision loss risk from weight-loss drugs “Wegovy” and “Mounjaro,” can cause blindness in severe cases — US FDA mandates warning.”
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