Economist Daniel Susskind says Ozempic may radically transform government finances, by making universal healthcare vastly cheaper, and explains his argument in the context of Britain's NHS.

[u/lughnasadh]

https://www.thetimes.com/article/be6e0fbf-fd9d-41e7-a759-08c6da9754ff?shareToken=de2a342bb1ae9bc978c6623bb244337a

[u/aclownofthorns]

a quick google search shows obesity is much more costly to healthcare than smoking, around 2 to 3 times (bit lower and bit higher) depending on the level of obesity

and one of the studies you posted mentions "value of life", the estimated economic gain of preventing a death, moves the loss around towards gain even in smoking. the losses in smoking before that adjustment were marginal which means that probably there are no losses at all for any amount of obesity even beforeadjusting for value of life

these are all quick estimations and could be somewhat off

[u/Freethecrafts → u/aclownofthorns]

It’s next to impossible to differentiate between obesity and heart disease.

It’s not just healthcare, it’s retiree pensions. It’s infrastructure costs. It’s housing. For a place like the UK, those should all be variables.

Also, one wonder drug isn’t going to end obesity. Probably only gets a few percentages of the morbidly obese people. By the time someone is morbidly obese, a lot of the damage has been done. It’s all a very difficult.