Luis Cereijo
Assistant professor of Physical and Sports Education and researcher in Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Alcalá
The development of glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonists has allowed the design of drugs that provide a clinical approach in specific cases where overweight must be urgently addressed to reduce risks related to cardiovascular morbidity. However, pharmacological treatment is not a solution to the population-wide problem of obesity. Obesity can only be addressed through a multifactorial framework that improves people's living conditions. Science has been pointing out inequality as one of the fundamental factors of obesity for decades. According to data from the 2020 European Health Survey in Spain, 24% of people with a low socioeconomic level live with obesity, while among those with a higher level, the prevalence is only 9%.
Embracing pharmacological treatment as the only solution implies chronicling obesity, giving up on modifying the causes that worsen people's health. This means giving up the idea that an improvement in living conditions allows individuals to improve their physical activity, dietary, and rest habits. Adopting an individual-focused pharmacological treatment approach will allow these underlying causes to continue affecting people's lives. Therefore, it is urgent to focus on the root causes and address social health inequalities as a population-based problem stemming from living conditions. Excess weight should not be perceived as the problem but as a symptom of what is reducing the quality and life expectancy of individuals.
Moreover, the way we have received this drug as a kind of 'silver bullet' to eliminate obesity should make us reflect on how we relate to overweight and obesity. Narrowing the approach to reducing people's body weight while ignoring the other elements that worsen their quality of life deserves reflection from those who bear responsibility for public discourse. Because the development of GLP-1 will not solve the serious problem of stigmatizing individuals living with excess weight.