Stephen Fry has issued a stark warning on using “fat jabs” such as Ozempic after he suffered serious side effects.
The former QI host, 66, recently revealed that he had taken the medication to help shed the pounds. But despite dropping an astonishing 5 stone thanks to the drugs, it also came with some horrendous side effects.
Fry admitted that he had taken up the jab early on, when Ozempic first became available in Canada and America in 2018. Used as a treatment for obesity and diabetes, Ozempic had been hailed as a “miracle drug” to help cut weight, before several high-profile celebrities warned against its use.
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Amongst the other celebrities who have taken the drug are former X Factor judge Sharon Osbourne and comedian Amy Schumer. However, several other Hollywood stars have been reported to be taking the drug in order to reach their weight goals.
Stephen opened up on how before taking Ozempic, he was at an unhealthy weight and wanted to drop some pounds to help feel more confident. Once he began taking the drug, he was “amazed” at the ability Ozempic had to stop his cravings for food and alcohol.
However, things soon took a turn for the worse when the injectable medicine was triggering a number of horrific side effects that affected his physical health drastically. He was eventually forced to stop the injections after going into vomiting fits at least five times a day at the height of the health problems.
Speaking to the Mirror, Stephen explained: “I tried Ozempic years ago; I’m an early adopter of these things. I happened to be in America, and I’d read about it, and I asked my doctor in America, my physician as they like to call them, and he said, ‘I think I can get you some.’
“He tried me on it, and the first week or so, I was thinking, ‘This is astonishing. Not only do I not want to eat, I don’t want any alcohol of any kind. This is going to be brilliant.’”
Fry continued: “Then I started feeling sick, and I started getting sicker and sicker and sicker. I was literally throwing up four, five times a day and I thought, ‘I can’t do this.’ So that’s it. The new variant Tirzepatide Mounjaro it’s called makes it even worse apparently.”
Amongst the side effects listed for the Ozempic are nausea, diarrhoea and vomiting, with some extreme cases of tumours in thyroids also being reported. The tumours were discovered after the patient’s body had a poor reaction to semaglutide, an ingredient in the drug, that is meant to improve glycaemic control in adults with Type 2 Diabetes.
Advice from the NHS states that patients should only use weight loss jabs if prescribed by a weight management service specifically for them. The NHS website states on the matter: “A doctor might recommend that you take one of these medicines if diet and exercise changes have not worked on their own.”
Former Celebrity Big Brother star Sharon Osbourne recently came out both in favour of and against the drug itself. Sharon, 71, said there were no regrets in using the drug to get to her current weight.
Opening up on Loose Women, she insisted: “I don’t regret it. Everything with weight with me was, ‘I want it now.’ The injections that I was on worked, but it just seems that now I can’t put anything on really.”
But in a previous interview in September last year, she revealed that at one point she did have second thoughts about trying the drug, adding that she felt she was “too gaunt” and she could not put any weight on after trying the injections.
“I want to [put weight on] because I feel I’m too skinny. I’m under 100lbs, and I don’t want to be; be careful what you wish for,” she warned.
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk