Just this week a friend added herself to the ever-increasing circle of people I know who are “on the pen.” She can’t be more than a size 12 — actually, make that a 10 now — but she had a prescription from an online private clinic for the weight-loss drug Mounjaro. How did she manage it, I asked her. Surely she didn’t look overweight enough to qualify. “I just used A.I. to adjust the photos I sent them, lied about my height and weight on the online B.M.I. calculator, and said my excess weight was causing me to suffer from sleep apnea. It’s quite a hard one to disprove,” she said cheerily.
Last year 1.6 million adults in the U.K. used weight-loss drugs, according to researchers at University College London. Another 3.3 million are apparently keen to join them. Prescribed by the NHS for those with a B.M.I. of 35 or more (24.9 being considered the upper limit of a healthy weight range) and weight-related co-morbidities like heart disease or type 2 diabetes, these drugs can have miraculous results.