[Dr. Steven Klein is an] addiction medicine fellow at the nonprofit Caron Treatment Centers’ residential treatment facility in Pennsylvania. He prescribes [medications like Ozempic, Mounjaro, and Wegovy] to his patients in recovery to treat their obesity or diabetes, and says they report reductions in unhealthy urges for both drugs and food.
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Could these medications — collectively known as GLP-1 receptor agonists — also fight America’s most difficult drug problems?
Striking new data suggests they might. [T]he journal Addiction published a study that examined the medical records of half a million people with opioid use disorder and found that those who were taking GLP-1 drugs, for any reason, had a 40 percent lower overdose risk compared to people not on these drugs. The research also looked at the medical records of over 800,000 people with a history of alcohol use disorder and found that the number of medical visits that noted current alcohol intoxication was halved in patients who were prescribed GLP-1 drugs, compared with patients who did not take the drugs.
