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For much of her life, Alyssa Frazier found solace in cooking. Frazier, a former food journalist from Minnesota, used to enjoy the process of preparing her favorite dishes, like chicken and vegetables or pasta. But after starting the popular weight-loss drug Wegovy, her culinary passions seemed to disappear as she lost interest in food — and some foods became especially unappealing. Many spicy dishes lost their appeal, and certain meats began to taste too much like the “barnyard” where the animal came from, she says. Even her favorite wine, which usually tasted fresh and citrusy, became oddly “vegetal.”
Like Fraser, other users of Wegovy (which goes by the generic name semaglutide), as well as Ozempic (a form of semaglutide used to treat type 2 diabetes), Zepbound (known by the generic name tirzepatide), and other drugs commonly called glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1) receptor agonists, have described unusual changes in their taste preferences. GLP-1 drugs, originally designed to treat type 2 diabetes by stimulating insulin release, can lead to weight loss by making people feel full faster. However, in addition to increased satiety, some report changes in their food preferences — they suddenly find meat disgusting, fried foods too heavy, and spicy snacks unappealing. On online forums and in scientific surveys, some have expressed a general decline in interest in food in general — some even claiming that the drugs have redefined food for them as a necessity rather than a pleasure. These observations may be reflected in grocery store data showing that people taking GLP-1 drugs spend less on food, especially on high-calorie and processed foods.
Some preliminary evidence suggests that changes in food preferences may contribute to weight loss, but it’s unclear how much such changes contribute to this outcome compared to the drugs’ effect on satiety. Research on this phenomenon has mostly been conducted in animal models or small studies involving people. However, experts are beginning to get some clues about how common these apparent changes in food preferences and tastes are among users and what might be behind them.
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