Not only is there a fever for Ozempic, but the drug's patent will soon expire and much more affordable generic versions will be arriving. This is more than good news for diabetics or those who take it to lose weight: according to many studies, GLP-1 receptor agonists, which is the technical name for the thing, reduce alcohol, cocaine, and tobacco consumption among addicts, prevent heart attacks, are associated with a lower risk of several types of arthritis, and may even slow memory loss associated with Alzheimer's. Although enthusiasm and economic interests should make us wary, there are indications that we are talking about a miracle drug.
But of course: to the healthy skepticism that we should all have, I want to add a sad report that I came across this week. In "Marriage and Sex in the Age of Ozempic," the journalist from New York Times Lisa Miller posed a question to the diary's readers, specifically for couples in which one partner had undergone treatment and the other hadn't: "Could you explain how a drug like Ozempic and the subsequent weight loss changed your relationship?"
And although she reviews many cases, Miller focuses on the story of a crisis: a man and a woman who, after their respective divorces, found themselves in middle age in a relationship centered especially around shared pleasures. They ate, drank, and had sex aplenty, to the point that it became a feature of their identity that they liked to show off and that made them happy. In the house they built to live together, they made a special wine refrigerator in the middle of the dining room.
Everything was wonderful until she, who had always been somewhat overweight, gained so much that she became upset and began a weight-loss treatment with Ozempic. And after a while, she had lost 25 kilos, but also her interest in excesses: she barely drank and they went over a year without sexual relations. The objective of the report was not scientific—to point out strictly physiological side effects of the drug—but to talk about psychological and symbolic dynamics, that is, how our lives can change if we change our perception of ourselves in this type of weight-loss process, what happens if we exchange a life script full of hedonism for one full of hedonism. The story ended with him longing for her body and saying "Everything is crap," and she being crystal clear that having lost weight gives her a sovereignty that she does not want to give up: "I still firmly believe that this is one of the best things I have ever done for myself."
It is impossible not to connect this case with the rise of the contemporary health cult: gym memberships keep growing, the alcohol consumption rate keeps falling, young people are having less sex, tobacco is to be banned in public spaces, etc. It happens that our cultural climate defines health In a very specific way that, without wishing to politicize it, I think is worth calling capitalist. It's health understood as a promise of satisfaction in the future in exchange for chaining sacrifices in the present; the idea that complete happiness is possible if we accumulate sufficient profits for the enterprise that we are ourselves.
The novelty I see in all this Ozempic thing is that, traditionally, moderation was seen as the key to freedom, that the spiritual task par excellence was to keep at bay certain excesses that make us lose our minds, such as unbridled desires for fame, wealth, or pleasure. However, today we can undoubtedly speak of the risk of a slavery to moderation and a lack of cultural tools to make sense of excesses. Contrary to a certain cliché that sees the vindication of alcohol, partying, and risk as a self-important and individualistic proclamation, the reality is that defending a space of resistance against the mandate to optimize ourselves can be a way of protecting a collective interest.
Because, rather than choosing between moderation and excess, it's about recognizing that what makes life livable is always an excess: caring about those we love more than ourselves, devoting an inordinate amount of time and resources to a passion, getting together with a handful of strangers to try to change the unknowns in order to try to change things. In fact, the obsession with health is itself a kind of excess that keeps so many people hooked precisely because we can involve ourselves as a cause that asks great sacrifices of us. However, the big difference is that some excesses confront us with the recognition of our finitude, while others are based on ignoring it and making us believe that we could transcend it. Only the former liberate us.
It goes without saying that all this coming to terms with finitude is very difficult, and that the freedom I speak of has a bittersweet side. It's that mixture of joy and sorrow that appears when we consider the jewels of life along with its imperfect and transitory nature, which is no coincidence that it finds its place in the kind of dinners where we get together with our loved ones and always end up eating, drinking, and going a little longer than is reasonable.
