Drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy—also known as glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) or semaglutide medications —have been linked to increased suicidal thoughts, says a new study published in JAMA Network Open on Aug. 20. “A detected signal of semaglutide-associated suicidal ideation warrants urgent clarification,” the academic researchers noted in the study.
Using an expansive World Health Organization database of reported individual adverse reactions to medications, they conducted a disproportionality analysis of GLP-1 RAs semaglutide and liraglutide, looking for observations of suicidal thoughts, and found such thoughts to be greater than expected. What they found was a 45% greater rate of reports of suicidal thoughts associated with semaglutide than with all the other drugs in the database. Mixed findings in semaglutide studies It’s worth noting that findings were small, making up only 0.
35% of the total reports associated with the diabetes drug. There was also no evidence these drugs caused suicidal ideation. It’s also worth noting that, in January 2024, separate researchers came to an opposite conclusion: In a study published in the journal Nature Medicine looking at 240,618 patients prescribed semaglutide, researchers found that patients taking semaglutide compared with other non-GLP1R agonist anti-obesity medications had a lower risk of suicidal ideation.
Earlier, in July 2023, according to the newest study, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) began an ongoing revi.