GLP-1 Drugs and the Death of Effort
About 1 in 5 Americans were obese in 1990. Now it is about 2 in 5. In a decade, it will be 1 in 2.
That was the picture in January, according to a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. But its conclusions may be out of date.
A 2025 Gallup poll indicated obesity rates have actually decreased slightly over the past three years. In recent public appearances, United States Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. seems to have run with this idea, stating that obesity dropped 3 percent “in the last year.”
If true, then obesity dropped from 39.9 percent in 2022 to 37 percent last year and this year. This would be the first measurable decline in half a century of data and equate to roughly 7.6 million fewer obese adults.
What’s behind the weight loss? The survey credited the decline in obesity to millions of people using glucagon-like peptide weight-loss drugs.
According to Gallup News, the use of weight-loss injectables has risen sharply since early 2024. The estimated number of U.S. adults taking glp-1 medications for weight loss has risen from 3 percent in 2024 to 11 percent in 2026.
No widespread breakthrough in diet or exercise explains the drop in obesity. The only thing that changed is the sudden surge in glp-1 prescriptions.
Whether the obesity numbers are genuinely dropping or not, these medications are introducing a new set of significant health problems across the country. Serious organ and brain issues have developed that regulators are investigating as possibly linked to these drugs. Some people are already struggling mentally, and these drugs appear to exacerbate those problems, which include suicidal thoughts.
Medical research from the Endocrine Society’s 2026 meeting shows that people should be able to move more easily as they lose weight. Instead, people are exercising less and skipping daily activities that build strength and cardiovascular endurance. Ironically, the very thing that should improve their health ends up making them weaker and more fragile.
This reveals the common tendency of human nature: seeking health shortcuts. Given the choice, most people prefer an easy fix over hard work, even if the shortcut appears to be harmful. As a result, someone might look thin and healthy in the mirror, but inside their health is failing.
When people know a drug will bail them out, they take bigger risks and indulge in worse habits.
Those who gain most are processed food manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies. One industry profits by selling ultraprocessed foods that excite taste buds and destroy health to people who think they can have one without the other—especially when they can buy a monthly shot from the other industry.
It’s wild how easily and quickly we’ve accepted the idea of paying a lifetime subscription to stay at a normal weight—especially when we could accomplish the same thing in a much healthier way and freely.
Millions of people are taking these expensive shots without any idea what the side effects will be in a few years—or even sooner.
Step back from the ads, the slogans, the tidy acronyms—and the temptation—and what we are looking at is a massive industry altering the brain chemistry and metabolism of millions of people for years, knowing that it causes and will cause widespread physical and mental side effects.
But because it’s happening through prescriptions and consumer demand, it’s a free pass. So millions of Americans are pumping hundreds of liters of semaglutide, tirzepatide and orforglipron into themselves every month.
The journal Addictive Behaviors Reports says these same drugs are being promoted to “solve” drinking and smoking, expanding this mass experiment even further before we understand the effects.
Herbert W. Armstrong wrote decades ago about the temptation to use chemical shortcuts for “health” instead of addressing root causes. He wrote in The Plain Truth About Healing:
In the vast majority of cases, sickness and disease are caused by the violation of physical laws of health. Modern medical science attempts to find a chemical “cure” that will remove the effect while leaving the cause untouched.
That same warning directly relates to the increasing use of glp-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. We think we can outsmart the obesity problem with drugs, but Scripture warns us against this. Using chemicals to force our bodies into compliance rather than living by God’s design means we aren’t escaping the consequences; we’re simply delaying and compounding them. It is the Creator of the human body who created cause and effect. Man-made shortcuts always come at a cost.
“Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction …” (Galatians 6:7-8; New International Version).
Why not change the causes of obesity? Why not teach, motivate and help people manage their appetites, rebuild their relationship with food, practice self-control, and move their bodies? True health doesn’t come from syringes and a subscription. It is the effect of a cause: living in obedience to the biological, mental and spiritual laws of the Creator of the human body and mind.