Possible link between weight loss drug Ozempic and suicidal thoughts

Patients taking a commonly used diabetes and weight loss medication are more likely to experience suicidal thoughts, according to a new study.

It contributes to a broader debate about the drug and its safety.

The study, published Tuesday in the American Medical Association-affiliated Jama Network Open, is the first to search the World Health Organization's (WHO) database of suspected adverse reactions for reports of suicidal thoughts in patients who have taken the drugs.

It turned out that a larger proportion of such reports came from patients who had taken semaglutide – the drug that Novo Nordisk markets under the names Ozempic for diabetes and Wegovy for weight loss – than from patients who had taken other medications.

The study was carefully conducted and should prompt doctors to be more cautious when prescribing semaglutide to people with a history of depression or suicide attempts, wrote Francesco Salvo, a pharmacologist at the University of Bordeaux, in an editorial published at the same time as the results.

Other doctors described the evidence contained in the paper as weak and inconclusive.

“There are significant limitations,” said Stephen Evans, emeritus professor of pharmacoepidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Spontaneous patient reports such as those in the WHO database “are highly subject to bias, including due to media coverage,” said Prof Evans.

The authors acknowledged that the WHO database was known to lack important information that would enable the results to be classified, such as how long patients had been treated.

The data could be distorted because they were based on self-reports from patients and their doctors, it was said.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said this year that a preliminary evaluation found no evidence that taking drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy caused suicidal thoughts or actions.

The agency also said it could not rule out a low risk and was continuing its investigation.

In April, the European Medicines Agency's Risk Assessment Committee found that there was no additional risk of suicide or self-harm in people taking these medicines.

The EMA and FDA findings are consistent with data from clinical trials, Novo Nordisk said.

The company said it would work with regulators to monitor the safety of the drugs, including monitoring data from ongoing trials and real-life use.

The use of weight loss drugs like Ozempic has exploded in popularity in recent years; Elon Musk and celebrities like Oprah Winfrey, Whoopi Goldberg and Rebel Wilson speak openly about using slimming injections.

Ozempic was approved for use in the US in 2017 and in the EU in 2018.

His ability to help people lose large amounts of weight effortlessly and quickly spread quickly on social media.

In the United States, 20 million prescriptions for Ozempic were written in 2023, an increase of 5,000 percent since 2018.

Due to the global shortage of the drug, authorities around the world are warning users about counterfeit injection pens that are in circulation.

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