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Given that obesity is sorta culture war related and in the news a lot, I figured this story would be relevant: Weight-Loss Stocks Soar After Obesity-Drug Study Spurs Investor Frenzy
I am more convinced than ever that these drugs are not only the future of wright loss, but similar to Paxil, is also going to a part of culture too and another tool or crutch to mitigate the downsides of modernity, except instead of social anxiety , it's too much food. We're sorta collectively inflicted this on ourselves, as victims of our own success. The pendulum if progress has swung so far towards abundance that we need modern technology just to try to undo it.
I wonder what Big Food is going to do. They've spent decades perfecting hyperpalatable foods you can binge on, and now Big Pharma is cutting them off by directly suppressing people's hunger. They are now in direct competition.
There are surprising synergies (I promise the word works in this context) in scenarios like these. You have to start with understanding what metric the consumer optimizes when there are no limitations.
Health and Palatability have always been counter to one another. When given a choice, people have chosen Palatability. So the consumer maximizes palatability until they reach a point where their health falls off a cliff (and sometimes they keep going even after that).
So far, the food industry has worked with this limitation. Create the most delicious food, but stay under a certain calorie limit. If you think that 2000 calorie Cheese-cake-factory pasta was the limit.....hoo boy are you in for a ride. If the new drugs allow us to move the needle on the point where health falls off the cliff, then we are not going to necessarily see healthier people. We might just see unhealthier (and even more palatable) foods while people more or less stay in the same weight bracket. Portion sizes might go down, but calorie counts might stay the same. People might start having Bubble tea / liquid calories with every meal.
When fundamental limitations of industries go away, we often see the culture change dramatically. Once that happens, older intuitions on what industries worked well together and which were in conflict do not work anymore.
What I AM worried about, is drug dependence. If your eating habits only work in a world where you regularly consume these drugs, then you'll never be able to cope without them. Even worse, if the world is built with the assumption that everyone consumes them, then it will be especially hard for a drug-avoider to sustain themselves in that culture.
Isn't the whole point of Ozempic and friends that it's not a magic calorie burner, but an appetite suppressant? The market for food will simply shrink.
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You make the assumption that palatibility is infinite with more sweetness and more calories and sugars.
This is a ridiculous claim that needs accompanying sources.
The future of an America that requires weekly injections in order to stay healthy is basically "what's the cost to live an extra ten years?" Well, that cost is looking to be approximately 400$/month.
In my experience cooking (which is decent, but not noteworthily vast), adding extra salt, sugar, and fat is basically a cheat code for making tastier food. Not all tasty food is inherently unhealthy, but when you're eating at a restaurant and not watching them cook (and sometimes when you are, like on cooking shows), marginal extra butter probably improves critics' reviews.
There's a Laffer curve to it though. I love my salt, sugar, and fat, but you can only have so much of those things before it makes the food gross.
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I would argue they are not making this claim at all. The world of food is vast, and the arms race of palatability has been applied unevenly.
If a 10oz lasagna previously eschewed butter soaked breadcrumbs for toppings and went light on the mozz, but should now be 6oz with all that added in, then the nutrient density of the food overall has dropped.
That being said, you raise a good point - I'm already disgusted by some of the more exotic foods out there that are terrible for you. There is an upper limit to what empty food people will eat, probably represented by a deep-fried stick of butter. There's a distinct correlation between calories and feeling full, so even if weight loss drugs are only acting on the latter, they'll still reduce how much trash people are eating.
If you assume that our sugar addiction is a palatibility problem and not a physical one, certainly.
With the onset and effectiveness of semaglutide, it's becoming clear that it is a physical problem.
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