GLP-1s Are Not Just for Weight Loss

Are GLP-1 drugs becoming a long-term foundation of healthcare? 

In this clip from our episode "What JPM Signals for Healthcare in 2026", CareTalk hosts David Williams and John Driscoll discuss why GLP-1s may be evolving beyond short-term weight loss treatments.

Listen to the full episode here

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CareTalk is a weekly podcast that provides an incisive, no B.S. view of the US healthcare industry. Join co-hosts John Driscoll (Chairman, UConn Health) and David Williams (President, Health Business Group) as they debate the latest in US healthcare news, business and policy. 

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Transcript

John: 0:05

So these are the, these are the, the products or the GLP ones are those products that are the As appetite suppressants that historically, uh, that have been probably one of the fa they're, they're growing their, their, their popularities is, is, is as great as chat. GPT. It's one of the, the fastest growing consumer products that I've seen in pharma because there's the. There's the, the direct use of those, a appetite suppressants for folks who've got chronic metabolic disease who are having struggling with their weight control and diabetes. And now we're seeing for those same appetite suppressants, the fact that it appears to be anti addictive and also may have a pretty big impact on cardio cardiac health. And so when you add that cool cardio and metabolic category, it's a pretty monster. Um, uh, uh, those are, those are monstrously large categories of what drives chronic illness in the us. The other thing that's sort of interesting, Dave, is that initially two thirds of the people who started on these drugs, which were injectables with either an auto, auto pen, or uh, or a, you know, a conventional syringe, we're not taking it. So they, they were not staying on those drugs and so they would drop off. What was interesting, uh, right before we got into JP Morgan is the, the introduction of orals where people can start taking pills as opposed to, you know, having a syringe. And, and I think that could actually affect whether people stay on these drugs and the amount of interest on the part of pharma, because these are so popular and appear to affect. Or potentially promise to impact and reduce chronic illness across a number of different categories. It seems like every, nearly every large pharma company is interested in finding new ways to create these kinds of drugs or, or those like them. And that's got, you know, put a spring in the step of the, the, the, the, the pharma innovators. Not because of the cynical reason you suggested Dave, but because it, they appear to be. Pretty attractive ways to solve some of our, to maybe break the back of this, of this, of this obesity epidemic.

David: 2:22

Well, John, I don't think you're exaggerating. Um, and you're going a little bit with the, with the breadth of the different indications and what it could do for chronic illness in general. I think also the depth is worth exploring and so there's been diet pill creases before, like with Fen. Um, now some of those issues there's side effects, but also they just don't work as well. So the GLP ones actually have a really profound impact on, uh, you know, on weight. You saw a couple, there were a couple indicators of it recently that I would, that I would point to one. There was actually an analyst report that was talking about, you know, the airlines are gonna be spending less on fuel. Because they think the passengers are lighter. That strikes me as would be surprising. But that, but that's got a lot of attention. And then there was, um, you know, if you look at what's the impact on a population level, you could see sort of state by state obesity levels over time. That gets reported. Now the data are, are lagging the government data. But, uh, Gallup did a recent. Poll thousands of people and they asked about their height and their weight, and they calculated the BMI. And what they're showing is that actually that obesity is declining for the first time after increasing sort of for, as you know, as far back as the eye can see.

John: 3:30

Well, and, and I, and I, I'm not a necessarily a believer that people are going to admit whether they're putting on a few extra pounds or not. But you're, you're hearing about it in analyst reports and quarterly earnings of fast food manufacturers of fa of, of, uh, of effectively the, the, the, the, the, the fast food restaurants, the places where folks have historically gotten high caloric, not necessarily the healthiest foods. Uh. Those food manufacturers, distributors, and restaurants are, are talking about a decline and it's, it's certainly having an impact in the restaurant industry and it also appears to have an impact or maybe tied to the reduction in the use of alcohol, which also could be all of this. Dave, for all of the healthcare noise, this is a very good public health outcome. If in fact, these drugs. Uh, and the, and the, and the change in behavior can be continued. I mean, isn't, isn't this good news for the American public health system?

David: 4:34

Well, I don't really care about that, John, but you've mentioned some other, some other areas that, where there's an impact. So certainly there may be some businesses like alcohol and fast food that are maybe negatively. Affected, but I think you were pointing to also kind of the ecosystem, which is, if it's important for someone to stay on the product, it, it is not enough just to, to have it, even frankly, if it's in pill form. And so what I'm excited about is seeing some of these companies that are arising to say, make sure, let's actually get the benefit out of it. So keeping people on the product for longer, making sure that when they lose. Weight and per, you know, including muscle, perhaps some, sometimes, often a lot of muscle that they actually get into a strength training program. That the diet is going in the right direction. And so I think there's a lot of interesting healthcare services businesses around it. So it's not just the fact that all the farmers are interested in it, but what about all the other, uh, surrounding businesses? So the

John: 5:25

companion businesses that would help people get the best, most outta these drugs? I, I, I'm surprised at how big this is. This has become, and how large an interest pharma has in this. But you're absolutely right. There are gonna be a lot of companion businesses, um, that are tied to this. Keeping people on the drugs and making sure that people are actually stay healthy because there is, there, there are, there are some profound examples of muscle wasting when you lose too much weight too quickly, or you have a hard time eating enough protein to kinda stay on top of things.