BIOBRIEF
A new analysis of 25,213 U.S. adults without diabetes on GLP 1 drugs, the class behind Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro, and Zepbound, finds a slow regain begins after the one year mark.
If you start a GLP-1 weight-loss drug this year and lose weight, will it still be gone two years from now? A new Epic Research analysis of de-identified health records from 25,213 U.S. adults without diabetes who started a GLP-1 drug, the class behind Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro, and Zepbound, and stayed on it continuously finds that for most of them, yes.
Roughly 85% of year-one losers on semaglutide (Ozempic, Wegovy) were still holding or still losing weight at the 24-month mark. About 14.9% had regained at least a quarter of their first-year loss by then, up from 7.2% one month past the one-year mark. Full return to baseline stayed under 1.5%.
Tirzepatide (Mounjaro, Zepbound) tracked differently: about 52.9% were still holding their year-one weight at 24 months, and 39.3% were still actively losing. The full-return-to-baseline figure stayed at or below 1%.
The retention figures cover only patients who stayed on the medication and refilled within 60 days, the continuous-use rule Epic applies to its real-world studies, so the late-checkpoint numbers describe the people who tolerated and responded to the drug, not the average starting patient. The study does not address outcomes after discontinuation, side effects, cardiometabolic events, or cost.