/from thefreeonline on 14th Oct 2023 from Wikipedia/ News/ /Bloomberg
The wild popularity of Ozempic is bad news for McDonald’s, a British bank told investors
British bank Barclays is urging investors to short stocks in junk food retailers like McDonald’s and Pepsi due to the surging popularity of weight loss drugs such as Ozempic.
More than 40 percent of U.S. adults, including about 20 percent of children and teens, are considered obese. These Americans face elevated risks for type 2 diabetes, heart disease, liver disease, and various cancers, along with mobility issues associated with being overweight.
28.7 million of mainly poor US people have been diagnosed with diabetes and many are dependent on the drug Ozempic. When it was seen that Ozempic causes strong weight loss it was repurposed under the name Wegeby costing up to $1500 a month.
Even so its now so crazily popular with the rich its often hard for diabetics to find their medication.
If every obese US person were on semaglutide (the active ingredient) at its current price of $15,000 a year, the total cost would be roughly 10 percent of the entire U.S. economy, or $2.1 trillion. That’s not going to happen.
In the past six months, Hollywood Ozempic stories have reached an obnoxious level of ubiquity. TikTok has become overrun with #myozempicjourney testimonials and week-by-week photo collages of disappearing waistlines.
Endorsed by celebrities, Ozempic has already made its manufacturer the most valuable company in the EU.
In a note to investors on Tuesday, Barclays strategist Jigar Patel warned that the share price of firms such as McDonald’s Corp., PepsiCo Inc., and Altria Group Inc, the last of which owns multiple cigarette brands, may be set to take a dive.
Pharmaceuticals known as GLP-1 agonists may be responsible for this, Patel noted, according to a report by Bloomberg. GLP-1 agonists are used in the treatment of diabetes and can aid weight loss by slowing digestion and boosting the body’s consumption of its own fat reserves.
Anecdotal evidence also suggests that these drugs reduce cravings for addictive substances such as alcohol and nicotine.
see also .. Weight-loss drugs probed over ‘suicidal thoughts’
Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk has been developing these drugs for more than a decade, and markets them under the names Ozempic and Wegovy.
Novo Nordisk’s share value has more than tripled since 2020, pushing the company’s market capitalization above Denmark’s entire GDP and briefly dethroning French luxury conglomerate LVMH as the EU’s most valuable company.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk credited Wegovy as making him feel “fit, ripped, and healthy” last year, while the drug has been endorsed by a host of Hollywood actors.
“The impacts of GLP-1s potentially introduce disruption into a number of industries,” Patel wrote, with Bloomberg noting that an index of packaged food companies on the S&P 500 has fallen 14% this year, even as the entire S&P has risen by around 10%.
However, Patel advised investors that some firms will benefit from the weight loss craze, including CVS Health Corp., which owns the CVS pharmacy chain and Aetna health insurance company.
While strong sales and a rash of good publicity has made Novo Nordisk extremely wealthy, European regulators are currently probing Ozempic and Wegovy over reports that they cause suicidal thoughts and self-harm among some users.
The EU and other western states are not far behind, with cheap fattening addictive ‘junkfood’ priming the obesity plague.
Most obese people can’t stop eating, their body and organs are hooked. So at a reasonable price semaglutide can stop their hunger pangs, slim and trim them and restore them to health.
The obvious solution is to force the profiteers to allow it to be a generic drug,and make it cheaply or freely available to obesity sufferers under national health systems,
In early 2023, however, they represent an elite cultural scam more than a medical intervention. The market is symptomatic of criminal predator exploitation, medical, vaccine and big pharma speculation and fake dangerous weight-loss cures, rather than any concern for public health, especially in the US.
The Free 