Early in the Ozempic explosion, many users reported drastic loss of food cravings — ranging from specific vegetables to junk foods and desserts. Some even said they lost their taste for beer and wine.
A group of scientists jumped on those anti-alcohol anecdotes and decided to see if the weight loss drug could also serve as a treatment for alcohol addiction. They reported promising findings in JAMA Psychiatry. The study reported that a small weekly dose of the drug, compared to a placebo, cut down on craving, quantity, and frequency of alcohol use.
This discovery is especially promising because alcohol abuse is both prevalent and problematic. In terms of prevalence, according to the U.S. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, 28.1 million adults who are 18 and older reported some form of alcohol use disorder in 2023. Younger age groups also reported significant alcohol abuse.
Barriers to Sobriety
The problem is twofold. Alcohol abuse has many major health effects. And, like many addictions, it is difficult to treat successfully.
That abuse often turns into major health problems, including death. The U.S. Surgeon General attributed about 178,000 U.S. deaths per year to alcohol. Many heavy drinkers also suffer from liver and heart disease. And more recent research can be attributed to alcohol.
Meanwhile, existing treatments have been a mixed bag, at best. Even though a third of U.S. adults have reported heavy drinking at some point in their lives, few have sought treatment. And of those who do, only a fraction are successful.
Read More: Here’s How Ozempic Actually Works for Weight Loss
Reducing Alcohol and Smoking
To study semaglutide, the active ingredient in both Ozempic and Wegovy, researchers essentially recreated a bar-like setting — but started its guests out with a kind of shot not normally associated with a tavern.
The researchers assembled 48 adults with untreated alcohol use disorder. Men had an average of 14 drinks in a week, as well as two or more episodes with five or more. Women averaged seven a week, with two or more instances of four or more drinks.
A week before their first injection, participants assembled in the bar-like lab setting. They could consume their preferred beverage over two hours. They received injections for nine weeks before re-assembling at the lab.
The researchers found that semaglutide had a stronger effect than other medications designed to reduce alcohol cravings. The semaglutide group significantly reduced their number of heavy drinking days. In the last month, that group reported no heavy drinking days compared to 20 percent of the placebo group. A few smokers in the semaglutide group also greatly reduced the number of cigarettes per day.
Read More: Ozempic and Other GLP-1s May Have Broader Health Benefits but Greater Risks
Promising Results with Caveats
The study was both relatively small (clinical trials for medication routinely use hundreds, if not thousands of participants) and relatively short term. But its results are, nonetheless, promising — especially since semaglutide is already an approved medicine.
“These data suggest the potential of semaglutide and similar drugs to fill an unmet need for the treatment of alcohol use disorder,” Klara Klein of the University of North Carolina School of Medicine and an author of the paper said in a press release. “Larger and longer studies in broader populations are needed to fully understand the safety and efficacy in people with alcohol use disorder, but these initial findings are promising.”
This article is not offering medical advice and should be used for informational purposes only.
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Before joining Discover Magazine, Paul Smaglik spent over 20 years as a science journalist, specializing in U.S. life science policy and global scientific career issues. He began his career in newspapers, but switched to scientific magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Science News, Science, Nature, and Scientific American.
