Ozempic and the politics of weight loss in the Middle East
Photo Courtesy: U.S. Federal Government (via Wikimedia Commons)
Ever since it rose to popularity last year, Ozempic has become something of society’s inside joke, especially when the type-2 diabetes medicine is promoted by various members of high society as a means of quickly losing weight.
The drug contains semaglutide - a chemical that tends to reduce appetite or increase feelings of fullness - and ever since that parcel of information was released, Ozempic has been in high demand. It reportedly helped boost Denmark’s entire GDP last year, alongside Wegovy - another semaglutide weight-loss medication. Even Elon Musk claimed that his use of Wegovy had helped him lose weight, reflecting the sort of endorsements that may have contributed to its popularity and consequent shortage.
Both medications are created - and patented exclusively - by Novo Nordisk, a Danish pharmaceutical company. Wegovy is advertised intentionally for weight loss; more perplexingly, Ozempic’s very own marketing strategies and info packs claim that it is not a weight loss medication, whilst at the same time promoting it for its effectiveness in reducing weight. As of right now, the long term negative side effects of the usage of these drugs by non-diabetics have not been seen, at least not yet.
What is very clear is that Ozempic targets vulnerable women. It is no secret that this is the case, and there are many articles discussing this phenomenon. More specifically, it targets people who are insecure about their weight. All of this applies especially to the Middle East, where the weight loss industry is forecasted to grow to almost a billion dollars by 2029, potentially due in part to the obesity and diabetes crisis in many countries in the region. The Middle East, and especially the Gulf region, has some of the highest obesity rates in the world. The number of obese women is also always comparatively higher, even often double, in comparison to men in most of these countries.
So, how is Ozempic affecting the region? The rise in obesity is indeed a worldwide trend, but its importance in the Middle East plays a special role because of the way women in the region have normalised the use of diet pills and weight loss medication as a tool to lose excess weight. Growing up in the Middle East, I was consistently surrounded by women on diets, utilising diet medication regularly in an effort to shed weight. In fact, it’s quite common to discuss weight loss amongst women in conversation, perhaps reflecting a deeper, weight-related cultural insecurity.
This is coupled with the fact that over the past few decades women in the region have been increasingly adopting disordered eating habits in an attempt to chase a particularly Westernised “look”. 40 percent of Arabs are now said to be “on a diet”, with Arab women specifically being at risk of developing eating disorders. Parallels can be drawn here to the way in which rhinoplasty and plastic surgery have taken hold of the region. Iran has the highest rate of rhinoplasty in the world, whereby women seek to adopt a smaller button-like, conventionally Eurocentric nose.
Arab women chasing Western and Eurocentric beauty standards in this way is an important contemporary phenomenon that is severely under researched despite its clear prevalence. This is especially the case when it comes to weight loss, where being more curvy was considered to be conventionally attractive until changes in beauty standards began to be introduced in the 70s. This rise in the use of diet pills and other weight loss strategies - some known to be dangerous and some not - reflects a sociocultural, internalised repression and demonisation of Arab beauty in the region. There is also of course the link between dieting, weight gain and disordered eating which are all part of weight-cycling - a phenomenon that poses many health risks. Similarly, Ozempic users for weight-loss purposes tend to gain weight after discontinuing use of the off-label medication.
And there are also side-effects to the financial components of the industry. For many, Ozempic is considered to be a miracle drug. After years of dangerous diets and weight loss medication with harmful side effects, it was seen as a breakthrough. But this is only for those who can afford it. Ozempic and Wegovy can incur costs upwards of 1200-1500 dollars per month. Perhaps there’s a reason why such medication is more in demand in more affluent regions. For example, there has been a striking boom in demand for this medication in countries like the UAE for non-diabetes related reasons. In the UAE, where there is a federal system in place, Ozempic can be purchased over-the-counter (OTC) in 5 emirates, with Dubai and Abu Dhabi being the only two emirates where a prescription is needed.
For those less fortunate, however, these price tags often result in serious health risks. Last November, 11 people in Lebanon had lethally low levels of blood sugar (hypoglycemia) after using fake Ozempic, an event which displays the dangerous proliferation of counterfeit drugs in response to low inventory as well as high demand. While these counterfeit medications have been spreading in Egypt, they have also been found in Germany and the UK. On the other hand, those who actually need the drug for diabetes related reasons may find that the drug they sorely need is not available for them. In Qatar, patients struggled with Ozempic’s shortage after having to switch to other medications with a whole new set of side effects (although the issue was not as pressing in the UAE due to the introduction of alternative diabetes drugs such as Mounjaro).
While long-term side effects will take years to find and prove, one thing has already been made abundantly clear: the Ozempic fiasco is far from over, and we are yet to see the medication’s full consequences. This is especially the case in regions like the Middle East where people might be particularly prone to unhealthy dieting behaviour, reflecting the increasing influential culture of thinness and Eurocentric beauty standards.