Affordable obesity drugs could bring seismic shift to health care, conference hears

Doctors back Ozempic-like drugs for wider health improvements at Global Healthspan Summit in Riyadh

A focus on prevention rather than treatment of sickness can have huge economic benefits, experts said at the Global Healthspan Summit in Riyadh. Photo: Reem Mohammed / The National

Governments should back “game-changing” weight loss drugs for the benefit of human health worldwide in a similar universal approach to the way vaccines were rolled out during the global pandemic, doctors said.

Speaking at the annual Global Healthspan Summit in Riyadh, which ran from February 4-5, experts said a new approach towards life-limiting health conditions was required after years of failure of public health initiatives. With a global focus on prevention rather than treatment for sickness, a seismic shift in the approach to health should be adopted around the world, with emerging medications set to play a vital role in reducing the costs of ill health.

Medications such as Ozempic and Wegovy, known as GLP-1 agonists, have transformed the way doctors treat diabetes and obesity, and their associated health conditions. Doctors are finding that this group of drugs is also showing success in treating several other conditions that often appear in old age, such as heart problems and Parkinson’s disease.

“This new technology injects new ideas, new questions, new possibilities, but also new moral concerns,” said Prof David B Allison, an obesity researcher and dean of the Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington. “A single injectable drug is unlikely to be the solution for everything, but we should not be dismissive of pharmaceuticals. GLP-1 drugs seem to have an extraordinary breadth of potential benefits ranging from addictions to quality of life. We keep talking about minor changes in physical activity, physical education in schools, but time after time we found that those don't make much difference. It seems to be a powerful thing to reduce the incidence of obesity and diabetes, and GLP-1 receptor agonists could be the solution.”

However, analysis of more than two million people in the US has shown that GLP-1 agonists also carry potential risks, such as arthritis and pancreatitis, which can be fatal.

Cost savings

Recent FDA approval of a more affordable, generic GLP-1 drug with similar properties has given hope that these drugs could be offered on a large scale, reducing the burden on treating sickness.

“We’ve heard about the tremendous cost savings that could be accrued if we extended health span,” said Prof Allison during the GHS talks. “I would encourage government action, just as we did with Covid-19 vaccines, to try to make them (GLP-1) as available and inexpensive as possible, to make them more freely available.”

A Global Healthspan Report, commissioned by the Hevolution Foundation in 2024, surveyed 4,000 people across 20 countries, alongside interviews with scientists, doctors and policy experts to understand more about the costs of an ageing global population.

Almost two-thirds of health professionals asked (63 per cent) believed health systems would not be financially viable by 2030 without a breakthrough in healthy longevity science. As well as emerging new drugs that promise to reduce the cost of treating expensive ailments, technological innovation can also help.

While AI-powered liquid biopsies promise to catch killer diseases before they take hold, the field of senolytics can target damaged cells before they wreak havoc on the body. Meanwhile mRNA vaccines and cell and gene therapy hold promise for stopping diseases from emerging altogether.

Ageing economic boom

Sir Jonathan Symonds, chairman of GSK, told the conference that keeping people healthy and working into old age can have significant economic benefits.

“The terrifying part for many governments is the increasing burden of dealing with sick people today when what they actually want is a system of prevention,” Sir Jonathan said. “Investing in the health of people who aren't manifesting themselves with disease is really important, because you will be investing before you start to realise the economic benefits that come from keeping people employed or socially and economically engaged.”

In the New Agenda for Global Health report, 97 per cent of financial professionals said healthy longevity investments could yield greater financial returns than traditional healthcare investments. But they also said tight regulations around research could stand in the way of the most rewarding innovations and called for greater support for those recognising early diagnosis and prevention.

“You've got to be able to demonstrate how your product or your intervention directly impacts healthspan, but also the economic outcome,” Sir Jonathan said. “Five years ago, I don't think we thought of getting ahead of disease quite in the way that we're discussing it now (at GSK), but that is exactly what we have to do.”

Financing old age is a major issue facing many nations, with some already extending retirement age to pay for the increasing burden on social care, paired with reduced productivity. Most countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development aim to gradually increase the retirement age of workers.

In Germany, it will increase from 66 to 67 by 2031, while in the UK, it will rise to 68 from 2044. Meanwhile, in China, statutory retirement will be gradually increased over a 15-year term for men until they are 63, up from 60, and 55 in women.

How to finance the cost of an ageing global population was a key topic at the Riyadh conference, with keeping people fit and healthy in their 50s holding huge potential for rich economic dividends, experts said.

Faisal Alibrahim, minister of economy and planning in Saudi Arabia, said changing life expectancy had accelerated change in pensions structures, and the length of time people will have to remain in work. “Pension systems in the past focused on a model or a formula that says 40 years of work, 20 years of savings and retirement, but we're seeing life expectancy going up to 90 years globally,” he said. “One of our targets was to grow life expectancy and of course that was when Vision 2030 started. Today we understand things better, so we're focusing on healthy average life expectancy.”

Live longer, work longer

By 2030, Mr Alibrahim said life expectancy was expected to average 80 in KSA. Pension reform is under way there to improve productivity from the workforce.

“It's important to keep in mind things such as pensions, preventive medicine and careers,” said Mr Alibrahim. “We used to view careers as ladders, today they are continuums. In Japan, AI and automation is used to augment an ageing population, and today in the kingdom, we've already tackled that through a biotech strategy, through investing in the 4th industrial revolution and through focusing on AI. We want to be power users of generative AI which will help us to be more productive as we grow older.”