A sweeping Danish study reveals a harsh truth about today’s most popular weight-loss drug: more than half of adults stop taking semaglutide within a year.
Despite its dramatic ability to cut pounds by curbing appetite, high costs, unpleasant side effects, and health complications drive many users away. Younger adults and men are especially likely to quit, raising red flags since discontinuation often leads to weight regain.
A Breakthrough Drug With a Big Problem
A new group of anti-obesity medications known as glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RAs) has been shown to be highly effective at supporting weight loss. Yet findings from a large population study presented at this year’s Annual Meeting of The European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) in Vienna reveal a striking challenge: in Denmark, half of adults without diabetes who begin taking the weight-loss drug semaglutide stop using it within a year.
“This level of drop off is concerning because these medications aren’t meant to be a temporary quick fix,” explained lead author Professor Reimar W. Thomsen from the Department of Clinical Epidemiology, Aarhus University and Aarhus University Hospital, Aarhus, Denmark. “For them to work effectively, they need to be taken long-term. All of the beneficial effects on appetite control are lost if the medication is stopped.”
Promise, Price, and Unequal Access
GLP-1RAs, a class of medications that includes semaglutide, were originally created to help manage diabetes. Researchers later discovered that these drugs also suppress appetite and strengthen feelings of fullness sent from the gut to the brain, which makes them effective tools for weight loss. Semaglutide is now widely prescribed under the brand names Ozempic and Wegovy. Their popularity has surged, but access comes at a steep cost. The high price of treatment raises concerns about worsening health disparities, since obesity already disproportionately affects marginalized racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups.
When treatment is stopped, weight regain is common, indicating that many people may need to continue the medication to sustain progress. Even so, growing evidence suggests that a significant number of patients stop taking these drugs not long after beginning, and until recently, reliable population-level data on discontinuation have been scarce.
To address this gap, researchers analyzed nationwide health records to assess how often and why adults (aged 18 or older) without diabetes stopped using semaglutide for weight loss. The study covered individuals who began treatment between the drug’s launch in Denmark (December 1st, 2022) and October 1st, 2023.
Among 77,310 first-time semaglutide users identified, more than half (40,262; median age 50 years, 72% women) had ended treatment within one year, with 18% discontinuing by 3 months, 31% by 6 months, and 42% by 9 months. This raises the key question: why are so many people giving up on the drug?
The Role of Cost in Quitting Early
The analysis found that the most common factor influencing the likelihood of discontinuation was age, with younger users aged 18-29 years 48% more likely to stop treatment within the first year than those aged 45-59 years, after controlling for sex differences. Similarly, users living in low-income areas were 14% more likely to discontinue treatment within the first year than those living in high-income areas.
Both of these factors highlight the likely impact of high costs of these medications (2000 Euros per year for the lowest dose of semaglutide as of June 2025), which is an important barrier to treatment for many people.
When Side Effects Push Users Away
Additionally, people who had previously used gastrointestinal medications—which may indicate they are more vulnerable to the common adverse gastrointestinal side-effects reported by GLP1-RA users, such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhea—were 9% more likely to discontinue semaglutide within the first year.
Similarly, people with a history of psychiatric medications were 12% more likely to discontinue treatment within the first year, while those living with cardiovascular disease or other chronic conditions were around 10% more likely to stop treatment early, also suggesting a higher likelihood of experiencing adverse effects. “This is particularly concerning given that people with obesity-related comorbidities may reap the greatest benefit from treatment,” said Professor Thomsen.
Gender Gaps in Staying the Course
The study also found that men were 12% more likely to stop treatment within a year than women, which might reflect unsatisfactory weight loss, given the better weight loss outcomes generally observed in women taking GLP-1RAs than men.
“These results are new and shed light on the reasons for high rates of early discontinuation of semaglutide for weight loss in a real-world setting,” said Professor Thomsen. “With over half of adults in Europe living with overweight or obesity, understanding who may benefit most from interventions that encourage adherence is essential to improving treatment use and subsequent health outcomes and quality of life.”
Limits of What the Data Reveals
Despite the important findings, the authors acknowledge several limitations of the study, including the fact that anthropometric measures such as the exact BMI are not generally available in Danish health registries, and they could not assess individual-level income, insurance coverage, or out-of-pocket pay, which could partially affect the conclusions. They also note that milder side effects, such as gastrointestinal complaints and other potential reasons for discontinuation, cannot be captured fully in registries and were likely underestimated. Finally, the researchers did not have information on the amount of weight loss achieved after semaglutide initiation.
Meeting: Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD)
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3 Comments
‘Meditation-Summer’
‘Exercise-Winter’
The FDA approved this knowing what SEs happened. Shameful. I have to quit due to arrhythmias. Wretched American pharmaceutical pigs.
American companies are not making these. Americans are being gouged by Denmark. Of course, they are concerned that they may not be able to keep 50 million Americans on their drug for 20+ years, bleeding the US. They are making so much because the US does not negotiate drug prices like other countries. The UK pays less than 10% per shot, what we do.
And while there may be some negative side effects, there are positive ones too, they keep discovering.
You should be blaming the Federal government for not getting these drugs cheaper.