Weight loss drug Wegovy will become available to buy in Irish pharmacies from the end of March. 

Clinical trials have found that people who are on the prescription for a year can lose more than 10% of their body weight. 

Those who take it find they crave food less and this helps them lose weight. 

Common side effects of the medication include headaches, nausea vomiting, diarrhoea, constipations and abdominal pain.

However, the European Medicines Agency approved it on the grounds that “Wegovy’s benefits are greater than its risks”. 

On The Hard Shoulder, podcaster Belinda Hogan recalled how taking the weight loss drug Ozempic has changed her life. 

“I read about it in the newspaper,” she said. 

“Then I went to my doctor and asked him if he would prescribe it for me. 

“He declined and then I went online and made it my business to find it through an online prescribing doctor.” 

A box of diabetes medicine Ozempic in a pharmacy in November 2022. Picture by: ANP / Alamy Stock Photo

Ms Hogan said she did not feel nervous about taking the drug and was keen to try anything to lose weight. 

“I think I was so low at that time I would have taken anything,” she said. 

“Well not anything but I would have tried anything.” 

The impact of the drug on her body was not instantaneous but has been transformative. 

“I lived with the disease of obesity for 30-years,” she said. 

“I would have spent decades in the cycle of dieting, gaining weight back and relapsing over and over again. 

“Then when I started taking Ozempic… slowly, slowly, slowly things started to change for me. 

“I felt that the food noise that I had heard in the back of my brain for 30-years was switched off - that happened really quickly for me.” 

An Ozempic pen. Photo by Jason Bergman/Sipa USA. 

Ms Hogan said the “ferocious hunger” she experienced for years is gone and she now eats things “without guilt”. 

“I know people say it’s a miracle drug and I don’t want to refer to it as a miracle drug but some things that happen to you while you’re on this medication feel like a miracle,” she said.  

An estimated one-in-eight American adults has tried a weight loss drug such as Ozempic or Mounjaro.

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Main image: Wegovy. Picture by: Alamy.com