Sales of weight loss medicines like Ozempic and Mounjaro have sky-rocketed in South Africa in recent years, although they remain too expensive for most people who might benefit from the jabs. In the first article of this Spotlight special series, Catherine Tomlinson tracks their remarkable rise and assesses when they will become more widely available here.
Health workers have long relied on Body Mass Index (BMI) as a way to measure whether people are within a healthy weight range. Now, a collection of top researchers have made the case for a new way to understand and diagnose obesity. In part two of this special Spotlight series, we take a look at what this new framing might mean for South Africa.
Authors of a recent Lancet report argue that obesity should not just be seen as a risk factor for other diseases – but in some cases, should be seen as a disease itself. The position could change how we treat obesity globally. In the first of this two-part Spotlight series, Jesse Copelyn breaks down the debate around the issue, and its implications for health policy.
Obesity is a complicated public health issue that can be devastating on both the societal and the individual level. New weight loss medicines have shown remarkable efficacy in clinical trials, but their high cost is limiting uptake. Amy Green asks where these new medicines should fit into South Africa’s response to rising levels of obesity.
