The fat-busting jab used by celebrities including Rebel Wilson, Sharon Osbourne, Stephen Fry and Elon Musk, has helped thousands lose weight.
Now, several MPs have confessed to taking the ‘game changing’ weekly injections too.
Last week, Tory leadership contender Robert Jenrick revealed he took weight-loss drug Ozempic ‘for a short period of time’ in a bid to shed the pounds.
The former immigration minister, who is bidding to replace Rishi Sunak, lost four stone in 12 months after realising he was ‘overweight’.
However, he’s not the only politician who has confirmed to dabble in the weight-loss jab.
Tory leadership contender Robert Jenrick, pictured at the beginning of this month, has revealed how he took weight-loss drug Ozempic ‘for a short period of time’
The former immigration minister, pictured in July last year, has lost four stone in 12 months after realising he was ‘overweight’
Injections of semaglutide, the genetic name for the jabs Ozempic and Wegovy, mimic GLP-1, a hormone made naturally in the body that helps slow the passage of food through the stomach — which makes people feel less hungry.
This alters the brain’s appetite regulation, so that people feel satiated despite eating less and they also don’t experience cravings for sugary, fatty treat foods.
As a result, people don’t eat as much and lose weight.
They were originally designed to treat type 2 diabetes, but has gained attention as a weight-loss drug among a number of celebrities.
But there have been warnings of serious side effects to the drug, as well as nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea.
Mr Jenrick, 42, said Ozempic had been ‘helpful’ but he ‘didn’t particularly enjoy it’ and he has since ‘lost weight in the normal way by eating less… doing some exercise’.
Speaking to Politico about his own use of Ozempic, the Conservative MP for Newark said: ‘To be honest, I was overweight.
‘I took Ozempic for a short period of time, didn’t particularly enjoy it, but it was helpful.
‘Since then I’ve just lost weight in the normal way by eating less, eating more healthily, doing some exercise – going to the gym, going running.
‘I’ve lost four stone in 12 months.’
Semaglutide, as well as rival drugs liraglutide and tirzepatide, have been hailed as monumental breakthroughs in the war on obesity
Boris Johnson, pictured in 2023, wrote in the Daily Mail about his roller-coaster ride on Ozempic
After the injections started to leave him feeling sick, Boris pictured in 2020, ditched the jabs in favour of ‘exercise and willpower’
Boris Johnson, 60, also admitted to using the drug to shift a few pounds.
The former Conservative MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip wrote in the Daily Mail about his roller-coaster ride on Ozempic after it was recommended by a Cabinet colleague.
‘It’s a cinch, said the doctor. All you need to do is inject a tiny dose of clear Ozempic fluid into your abdomen, once a week, and hey presto no more raiding the fridge at 11.30pm for the cheddar and chorizo washed down with half a bottle of wine.
‘For weeks I jabbed my stomach, and for weeks it worked. Effortlessly, I pushed aside the puddings and the second helpings. I must have been losing four or five pounds a week – maybe more,’ he wrote.
But after the injections started to leave him feeling sick he ditched the jabs in favour of ‘exercise and willpower’.
However, he added that he might return when slimming drugs are refined: ‘I look at my colleagues – leaner but not hungrier – and I hope that if science can do it for them, maybe one day it can help me, and everyone else.’
Nadine Dorries before she made the decision to jump on the Ozempic bandwagon – her excess weight was mostly around her middle
Nadine Dorries, 67, former Conservative MP for mid Bedfordshire, admitted that she also jumped on the ‘Ozempic bandwagon’.
When she was still Culture Secretary two years ago, her doctor told her she was pre-diabetic. She was told to lose ‘at least 12lb’.
But even after dieting and making it out of the realms of ‘pre-diabetes’ she was told she still needed to lose weight.
A blood test revealed she had non-alcoholic fatty liver disease — a build-up of fat in the liver common in the obese and overweight, which can lead to more serious damage later.
Dorries took up yoga, pilates and started walking more, but still the scales did not move.
Eventually she started taking Mounjaro, the brand name for tirzepatide, a drug that activates two receptors — GLP-1 (which Ozempic also targets) and another called GIP — which slows the rate at which food is digested and lowers blood sugar.
Like Ozempic, Mounjaro suppresses appetite and stops you thinking about food, meaning you lose all interest in it and eat far less than you would normally.
She wrote in the Daily Mail: ‘I had no appetite, but didn’t miss food either. I simply didn’t think about it in the way I do on a diet, when the ever-present sensation of hunger means you’re constantly wondering when and what you can eat next.’
After three weeks on the drug she fainted. She admitted she had just forgotten to eat for almost 24 hours.
But by the end of the first month she lost nearly a stone.
In July she wrote: ‘I’m going to carry on for a second month (a doctor from the website rang me to chat through everything when I put in my second order) and then I’ll stop.
‘By the time I finish I should weigh 9st which will put my BMI at 23, in the healthy range. But I won’t go on. I have to get hold of this, which will require a degree of self-discipline.’
