The Dangers of Diet Drugs: Behind the GLP-1 Weight-Loss Hype with Ragen Chastain

May 6, 2024

Weight-inclusive health/fitness professional Ragen Chastain discusses dangers of GLP-1 weight-loss drugs, including potential side effects and conflicts of interest with drug manufacturers. Explores deceptive marketing tactics, risks in weight loss drug industry, relative vs. absolute risk in scientific studies, and controversies in integrative medicine spaces.

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Introduction

00:00 • 3min

Exploring the Intersection of Weight Science and GLP-1 Agonist Drugs

03:12 • 3min

Risks and Deceptive Practices in Weight Loss Drug Industry

05:43 • 22min

Relative vs. Absolute Risk in Scientific Study Reporting

27:21 • 4min

Deceptive Marketing Tactics of Weight-Loss Drugs

31:40 • 4min

Exploring Arguments on Weight Loss Solutions and Drug Side Effects

35:41 • 2min

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Writer, speaker, and weight-inclusive health/fitness professional Ragen Chastain joins us to discuss the potential side effects and other downsides of using GLP-1 drugs (like Ozempic and its ilk) for weight loss, the massive influence the manufacturers of these drugs are having on the public discourse about them, why the media don’t often report on these conflicts of interest, how drugmakers have co-opted talking points about weight stigma and weight cycling, how opposition to these drugs in some integrative- and functional-medicine spaces still perpetuates stigmatizing ideas about body size, and more.

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Ragen Chastain is a speaker, writer, researcher, Board Certified Patient Advocate, multi-certified health and fitness professional, and thought leader in weight science, weight stigma, health, and healthcare. Utilizing her background in research methods and statistics, Ragen has brought her signature mix of humor and hard facts to healthcare, corporate, conference, and college audiences from Kaiser Permanente and the Diabetes Education Specialists National Conference, to Amazon and Google, to Dartmouth, Cal Tech and canfitpro. Author of the Weight and Healthcare newsletter, the book Fat: The Owner's Manual, co-author of HAES Health Sheets, and editor of the anthology The Politics of Size, Ragen is frequently featured as an expert in print, radio, television, and documentary film. In her free time, Ragen is a national dance champion, triathlete, and marathoner who holds the Guinness World Record for Heaviest Woman to Complete a Marathon. Ragen lives in Oregon with her fiancée Julianne and a rotating cast of foster dogs.

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