Magic Pill – by Johann Hari

Most well-known for his book “Stolen Focus”, this one’s about GLP-1 receptor agonists drugs, their strengths, and their problems.

In this case, Hari himself opted for Ozempic, and this book chronicles his year-long journey on such, his personal experiences, and those he gathered from others along the way.

From a starting position of being a sedentary enjoyer of junk food with 32% body fat and a 40” waist, he was prompted to act after his similarly-aged, similarly-lifestyled friend Hannah died of a heart attack.

Being the science journalist he is, he also takes us through the history of the development of GLP-1 RAs, which sounds like it should be a very dry topic, but actually it’s very engaging reading.

He also talks us through the side effects, and differently than how scientific papers do. We’re accustomed to reading “nausea” and that’s it; instead we get a lengthy description of dry-heaving next to a potted plant in Zürich airport while onlookers assumed he was drunk, we hear about belching up bile, of accidentally taking a double-dose and being too ill to leave the house for several days, making it only the distance from the bed to the bathtub.

We hear, in short, about the disruption to normal life, in a way that adds a little color to the “many people stop because of the side effects”.

A lot of the book is also given over to the psychology and sociology of it, as much as the hard science. Why did the West become fat in the first place; what is driving this change, and are these drugs just a commercial solution to a commercially-made problem, and if so, is that just perpetuating the root cause?

Bottom line: ultimately, this text is both strongly for, and strongly against, GLP-1 receptor agonists. If you’ve been looking for a balanced book on the topic, this is it. And, as users of the new drugs grow in number, some have suggested that it will change humanity to an extent comparable with the invention of the smartphone. So, for or against or a bit of both, it’s good to at least understand them.

Click here to check out Magic Pill, and understand both sides!