Why shake inpoints such as Mounjaro harm the food industry

Symone has been using weight loss injections for almost a year. She says they have done what the diet industry could never do for her – freed her from a life that is controlled by food.

From a very young age, the 34-year-old could not eliminate the constant sound in her head. When would her next meal come? What would it be? Would there be enough for her?

“The food noise was just that loud, it can be unbearable,” she says. “I tried every diet – I did atkins, clean, slimfast, slimming world, meal replacement shakes – you call it – I did it and nobody has worked for me.”

A few years ago, with a weight of the 16th (102 kg), she was one of the many millions who registered with weight watchers, download the app and carefully following the point plan, scan in everything she ate and stayed within her daily points budget.

Weightwatchers attribute points to food and drink, which states that it uses a “groundbreaking algorithm” to assess their food makeup and then uses a point system to inform its members which food is better for eating.

But after a few weeks Symone says that she had the feeling that she was being founded to fail.

“How can I lose weight in the long term if I had to follow this MAD Points system? Food is not measured in points -it is measured in calories, fat, macro food substances.

“I felt trapped and the more research I did, the more I raised myself, the more I thought this wasn’t for me.”

All that has ever worked in her search to lose weight, she says, is Weight loss injection MounjaroWhich she started using almost a year ago.

“I was on my toughest, a little more than 21 stone, and the doctor told me that I was pre -diabetic. I knew something had to change – I have two children who were also dependent on me.”

She was advised to start with the drug for weight loss, but with a two -year waiting time she decided to buy it privately online and within a few days she cried from relief.

“I could not believe that I had control over food. For the first time I did not panic when I would eat the following.”

Weight loss Jabs work by simulating a hormone called Glucagon-like Peptide-1 (GLP-1), which suppresses people’s appetite and feels full.

Symone has now lost the 4th 7LB (26kg) and gradually loses and documents its experiences on social media.

“I don’t want a quick solution,” she says, “I use weight loss injections to give me the control I have never had.”

For many, Jabs of weight loss can produce rapid results, but some experts are concerned about the meteorical increase in their popularity and how people are influenced in the long term – both physically and mentally.

At its peak, weightwatchers were seen as synonymous with safe and controlled weight loss. With 4.5 million subscribers worldwide, the workshops were held in most cities, in most main streets, in local church halls – they were everywhere.

Now, after dominating the diet industry for more than half a century, it has lost more than a million members and submitted for bankruptcyStruggling to compete in a market that has been transformed by influencers of social media and injections for weight loss.

The company has emphasized that it is not going bankrupt and that submitting bankruptcy will help to resolve its fault of $ 1.25 billion (£ 860 million).

In a statement, the brand says that its weight loss program (which also includes his own brand of weight loss Jabs) and workshops for weight loss will continue.

The company says that it is the brand with the most scientific support in the diet industry for more than 60 years, and that there have been more than 180 studies published that demonstrated the effectiveness of its approach.

Weightwatchers says it uses a “holistic care model to” support “the whole person” with “access to clinicians and registered dietitians trained by obesity.

It is also one of the many companies that GPs can use for references for weight loss, where the NHS pays for patients to attend weekly meetings in the community.

“It’s no longer about calorie control and diets,” Deanne Jade, clinical director of the National Center for Eet Disorders, told the BBC.

“There is a new movement that is there and it’s all about well -being.

“People like to move in tribes -it used to be the weightwatchers -tribe, counting points and calories, now millions of different ways to lose weight or be healthy through social media influencers follow, due to drugs for weight loss, and they form new tribes.”

She is not convinced that medication will be the answer that so many are looking.

“None of these pharmaceutical interventions protects people against regaining weight when they stop injecting.”

She believes that they are not a quick solution, and that the best way to lose weight effectively and keep it off is too much too much to understand the psychological reasons behind.

Dr. Joanne Silver, main psychologist at London -based eating disorder Clinic, Orri, agrees. She says that the injections for weight loss “completely silence what the body requires”, which is contraindic to understand what the body needs.

“People can eat food for psychological reasons – they can use food to manage their emotions to calm themselves.

“Eating disorders are not just about food.”

Food and food have only become part of a more holistic approach that so many now assume when it comes to their overall well -being.

Jennifer Pybis, a fitness coach based in Liverpool, works both online and personally with customers. She says that achieving a healthy lifestyle is not only about achieving a target weight.

“I encourage the women with whom I work to consider many ways to measure their progress instead of just jumping on the scales.

“Thinking about how they feel, compare photos of themselves to see how their bodies have changed in shape, how their sleep is, their resting heartbeat, their improvements in the gym – that is all so important.”

The diet industry is perhaps transforming, but there are many who still prefer the more traditional model of sitting together and sharing their experiences, supporting others in their community to lose weight.

In a small church hall in Winsford, Cheshire, a group of women wait patiently to get on the scales.

Mumbling and benign laughter can be heard when they share their latest weights.

‘I put on a pound! I’ve had a little bit – maybe one lot – From wine on the weekend. “

“Why didn’t you have a gin?” Another asks: “It’s just 55 calories a shot!”

They are here for their weekly check-in at the Peerwighed Slimming Group. Some women have lost different kilos, others have placed a pound or two, but in general they have all lost weight since they came to the class.

They learn how to eat in moderation, how they can practice safely and how they can feel good about themselves.

At first glance it could be a class of Wiwatchers – women who meet to share and support their stories about weight loss – but there are crucial differences, says Beewighed -owner and founder Lynda Leadbetter.

She was a group leader for weight watchers for 18 years, but left to set up her own group in 2018.

“I think weightwatchers have something different and something hopeful for so many women, but I think it has lost the way,” she says.

“I learn nutrition, I learn, I don’t sell anything extra. I feel that weightwatchers have become about selling extra products, it was always about pushing those extra sales, and not about supporting people to lose weight.”

She is skeptical about the effectiveness of weight loss drugs, and some members who are up to the Loves Ozempic and Wegovy Have left her groups, but many have remained – continue to attend the meetings for support during the use of weight loss injections.

Kathryn Brady, 38, has been a member of Beeweighed since 2023 and at that time she has lost more than three stones. But with her wedding in a matter of weeks, the Burleske dancer Mounjaro started to lose weight faster.

It is not completely worked out as she had hoped.

“I have been on Mounjaro for more than a month, and while I lost 6 pounds in the first week or so, I have placed half of it again.

“It was really weird to have absolutely no appetite and I pay a lot of money to not lose so much weight.”

She will continue to use it, but she has not been completely sold yet.

“Even if I go on with the meager Jab, I will still be an additional movement, so that others there support me keeps me going.”