09/14/2026
KIDS ON GLP-1s
Hi
- Childhood obesity is a serious health problem, and earlier effective treatment may have a very large long-term upside
- I don’t love the idea of putting a 6 y/o on a medication they may need for decades, potentially forever especially without sufficient safety data
- That said, we DO have data associated with excess adiposity and since childhood obesity often persists into adulthood, we have to take that risk into account
- None of this is the child’s fault. Young kids have very little control over their food environment, neighborhood, family income, school environment, transportation, marketing exposure, etc
- Parents absolutely have responsibility. Saying systemic factors matter does not mean parents have no responsibility
- At the same time, many families are operating inside environments that make healthy choices much harder than they should be
- “Just feed them better and make them exercise” is not an adequate explanation for a population-level problem this large
- Pharma companies obviously have financial incentives here. That doesn’t mean they created the underlying childhood-obesity problem
- Ideally, we would address the food environment, poverty, food access, safe places to play, school activity, healthcare access, and the other upstream factors contributing to this
- I’m just not confident those changes are happening quickly enough to help the kids who need treatment right now
- Long story short, it’s basically the same conversation we have around adults, except these kids have less autonomy, potentially more upside from early treatment, and even less data on the long-term risks
Whatcha think?
👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼
