Nutrition Don't miss out on the headlines from Nutrition. Followed categories will be added to My News. Make 2025 the year you lose weight but also get strong and lean.
Lose the moobs and the belly fat, the love handles and the paunch, and replace them with lean muscle tissue that will leave you looking years younger but will also fire up your metabolism and enhance your health span. In the pursuit of speedy weight loss it is easy to lose sight of what our bodies need to stay healthy in midlife and beyond. Drastic new year diets and fat jabs can have a dramatic effect on our waistlines, but at what expense? “If we lose weight rapidly and without exercise intervention, there is often a sharp drop in muscle tissue as well as body fat,” says Jonathan Folland, professor of neuromuscular performance at Loughborough University.
“Without realising it, that kind of weight loss can seriously impact physical health and longevity.” Semaglutide, the active ingredient in the weight-loss jab Ozempic, works by mimicking the hormone glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), helping to control blood sugar levels, slowing down stomach emptying and suppressing appetite. The effects are impressive, but one large study involving 1,961 obese adults that was published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that almost 40 per cent of the weight some people lost came from lean mass, which included muscle, alongside some bone and organ tissue.
Severely restricting calorie intake without attempts.