A new report by Wells Fargo spotlights how GLP-1 weight loss drugs are reshaping the healthcare industry by addressing obesity.

Wells Fargo released a report Thursday which notes that much of the American healthcare system has been structured around obesity, given it has become a foundational condition in the country with 40.3% of adults considered obese and 9.4% severely obese.

Usage of GLP-1 drugs surged in recent years, rising over 140% from 2022 to 2024, which had a significant impact on hospital services aimed at treating obesity. In that same timeframe, bariatric surgery volumes fell 34.1%.

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Philips plans to invest more than $150 million in U.S. facilities. (Philips)

“GLP-1s may be marketed as weight-loss drugs, but they’re rapidly becoming one of the most disruptive economic forces in healthcare,” John Teasley, market executive for Wells Fargo Healthcare Banking, told FOX Business. “We’re seeing a medication class with the potential to reshape how providers generate revenue, where investors allocate capital, and how consumers engage with their health.”

The report said that the healthcare system and hospitals in particular are having to adapt to a changing landscape caused by the rise of GLP-1 semaglutide drugs, as obesity patients who previously would’ve undergone surgery after attempting to diet now have a pharmaceutical alternative that is “visible, reversible, and socially normalized.”

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GLP-1s may also have an impact on cardiology, with a trial showing that their use reduced major cardiovascular events by 20% in overweight or obese adults without diabetes. If that trend prevails at scale, hospitals would see fewer procedures, repeat admissions, complications and other downstream interventions – leading to a sizable reduction in demand for those services.

A woman injects a GLP-1 injection into her stomach in this undated photo taken at an undisclosed location. (iStock)

Other aspects of managing chronic obesity may also evolve with increased use of GLP-1 therapies, with more longitudinal management, outpatient visits, side effect monitoring and medication management. It could also have implications for treating comorbidities driven by obesity, like knee and hip replacements, sleep apnea and metabolic liver disease, the Wells Fargo analysts noted.

“The biggest takeaway from our research isn’t that healthcare is shrinking, it’s that healthcare is being rewired,” Teasley said.

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The report said that the rise of GLP-1 treatments is also reshaping the development strategies of pharmaceutical companies, noting an analysis by Deloitte that obesity drugs are now the largest component of the late-stage pipeline after surpassing oncology treatments for the first time in 16 years.

A photo illustration shows weight-loss injection pens resting on a scale that reads 176 pounds. (Michael Siluk/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

GLP-1 drugs drove that increase almost exclusively, raising obesity treatments from 1% of the pipeline in 2022 to about 25% now, while oncology slipped to 20% after being at 32% in 2022.

“Obesity therapies have already taken cancer as the pharmaceutical industry’s leading area of investment, reflecting growing confidence that these treatments could improve the health of millions of Americans while fundamentally reshaping one of the country’s largest industries,” Teasley said.

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The Wells Fargo report concluded that the likely winners in the healthcare industry will opt against trying to defend the old model, and instead reposition ahead of it – such as by reallocating capital and talent toward obesity medicine, integrated cardiometabolic care and specialty pharmacy services.

BATON ROUGE, La. — Researchers who have spent years studying GLP-1 weight loss medications say some of the drugs’ effects have caught even longtime experts off guard, five years into widespread use of medications such as Ozempic, Wegovy and Mounjaro, according to new findings highlighted by scientists at Louisiana’s Pennington Biomedical Research Center.

Dr. Steven Heymsfield, a professor at Pennington Biomedical Research Center and director of its Metabolism Body Composition Laboratory, has studied GLP-1 drugs for 15 years. He said the range of effects researchers have documented has included both expected and unexpected findings. “Some were predicted beforehand and others were completely surprising,” Heymsfield said. “So for example, we know that people who are obese have a higher risk of diabetes.”

Among the more unexpected discoveries, Heymsfield pointed to reports from patients describing a diminished desire to drink alcohol while taking the medications, an effect that has since gained scientific support. “The unpredictable type is that people report less desire to drink alcohol,” Heymsfield said. “And now there are studies beginning to show that that’s been confirmed.” That observation aligns with a broader body of emerging research; according to Forbes Health, a 2026 study published in BMJ examining more than 600,000 veterans with Type 2 diabetes found that GLP-1 medications were associated with a decreased risk of substance use disorders across all major drug classes, as well as fewer overdoses and hospitalizations among those with existing substance use disorders, compared with a different class of diabetes medication known as SGLT-2 inhibitors. Forbes Health noted that GLP-1 receptors are present in brain regions that influence impulse control and reward signaling, a mechanism researchers believe may help explain the reduced pleasure-seeking behavior associated with addictive substances. The outlet cautioned, however, that this research remains preliminary, and GLP-1 medications are not currently FDA-approved for treating substance use disorders specifically.

Heymsfield also highlighted improvements reported by patients with arthritis, describing reduced pain, less inflammation and improved mobility among users of the drugs. “People with arthritis have unexpectedly reported improved symptoms, less pain and less inflammation, and can walk better,” Heymsfield said, adding that studies have shown patients on the medications have needed fewer knee replacement surgeries as a result. That finding is echoed in more detailed clinical research presented at the American Diabetes Association’s 2026 conference, according to coverage from the American Journal of Managed Care, which reported that knee osteoarthritis outcomes improved with semaglutide, including meaningful reductions in pain scores and decreased use of pain medication, with tirzepatide’s greater overall weight loss producing similarly meaningful pain benefits.

Cardiovascular improvements represent another area where Heymsfield said the evidence has grown increasingly robust. “We’ve already shown with GLP-1s that it reduced the risks of heart attacks, cardiovascular disease, mortality,” he said, adding that researchers believe the benefit extends beyond simple weight loss. “And it’s thought that it’s not just the weight loss, but processes like inflammation also are improving that might mediate these effects on the heart.” That assessment aligns closely with a large international review published earlier this year and highlighted by ScienceDaily, in which researchers at Anglia Ruskin University analyzed data from more than 90,000 patients across major international clinical trials and found that GLP-1 weight-loss drugs such as semaglutide significantly lowered the risk of heart attacks, strokes, heart failure and premature death over multiple years of treatment, leading researchers to suggest the medications could ultimately become a major tool against cardiovascular disease more broadly, not solely obesity and diabetes.

Heymsfield emphasized that not every benefit observed in patients appears to be directly tied to weight loss itself. “It looks like it’s not just the weight loss, but these drugs that actually have themselves some properties that improve inflammation,” he said, noting that researchers are actively continuing to study that distinct anti-inflammatory mechanism. He also pointed to a phenomenon frequently reported by patients known as reduced “food noise,” describing it as a diminished preoccupation with thoughts about food throughout the day, a change some patients describe as a significant improvement in daily quality of life. At the same time, Heymsfield noted a more complicated emotional dimension to that same effect: for some patients, the medications’ dampening of food-related pleasure has led them to discontinue use altogether. “And if you lose that enjoyment, some people go off the drugs because they’ve lost that part of their life,” he said.

Alongside these benefits, Heymsfield and other researchers have continued to flag significant risks and open questions surrounding long-term use of the medications. Muscle and bone loss remain a consistent concern across virtually all patients using the drugs, according to Heymsfield, who said this side effect occurs in essentially everyone who loses weight while taking GLP-1 medications, regardless of other individual factors. He said researchers at Pennington are actively studying strategies to mitigate that loss, including increased dietary protein intake and resistance exercise training. That concern is echoed in more technical detail by a recent analysis published in the American Journal of Managed Care, which noted that higher-dose incretin therapies can drive lean-mass losses accounting for anywhere from roughly 25% to 40% or more of a patient’s total weight reduction, a dynamic that reduces resting energy expenditure and requires proactive assessment of sarcopenia risk, the medical term for age- or illness-related muscle loss. The same analysis pointed to supervised resistance and aerobic training combined with adequate protein intake, generally in the range of 1.2 to 1.6 grams per kilogram of body weight daily, as an evidence-based approach shown to help preserve or even increase lean muscle mass in patients using the medications.

Separate research from Washington University School of Medicine and the Veterans Affairs St. Louis Health Care System, published in January 2025, similarly identified a mixed picture of benefits and risks associated with the drugs. That research found GLP-1 medications were tied to decreased risk of dementia and addiction, alongside cognitive and behavioral health benefits, but also identified increased risk of certain gastrointestinal problems, along with kidney and pancreas conditions, including pancreatitis, among some users.

The rapid rise in GLP-1 medication use over the past several years has made these evolving findings increasingly relevant to a large and growing share of the American public. According to Forbes Health, roughly one in eight Americans has already used or is currently using GLP-1 medications to treat conditions including diabetes, heart disease or obesity, with some projections suggesting as many as 30 million Americans could be using the drugs by the end of the decade. Originally approved by the FDA specifically to treat Type 2 diabetes, GLP-1 medications have since expanded into treatment for a widening range of conditions, including cardiovascular risk reduction, obstructive sleep apnea, chronic kidney disease and liver disease, alongside their most commonly recognized use for weight loss, even as researchers continue actively investigating additional off-label applications, including potential treatment for addiction and binge eating disorder, through ongoing clinical trials.

As the body of research on GLP-1 medications continues to expand rapidly, scientists including Heymsfield have emphasized that understanding of both the benefits and risks associated with long-term use remains an active and evolving area of study, with researchers continuing to work toward strategies that can help patients preserve muscle and bone health while benefiting from the medications’ broader metabolic, cardiovascular and potentially neurological effects.

The Treasury Department on Thursday moved forward with new rules for investments in Trump Accounts that aim to exclude investment funds rooted in environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria, FOX Business has learned.

The rules restricting ESG funds from being included in Trump Accounts come alongside other rules ensuring that investment options in the accounts have low fees to ensure investors keep more of their money.

“Corporate America has rejected ESG ideology, and we will not allow it to be a part of Trump Accounts,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told FOX Business in a statement.

“These accounts exist to build financial security for America’s children, not to advance political activism or ideological agendas,” Bessent added.

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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told FOX Business the ESG restriction will help protect investors. (Reuters/Abdul Saboor/File Photo)

A Treasury Department official told FOX Business that under the proposed eligibility framework, an index would have to be designed primarily to measure the performance of a broad segment of the U.S. or global equity market using objective financial criteria.

The rule is intended to give families clear, transparent investment choices that are focused on cost, diversification and long-term financial performance.

ESG funds have faced criticism for their focus on other criteria, like the environmental and social policies of companies or their governance structures, ahead of investor returns.

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The Trump Accounts app features eight exclusive financial literacy modules. (U.S. Department of the Treasury)

Trump Accounts officially launched on July 4, and a Treasury spokeswoman said that in the month and a half since the launch, the number of families who have signed up for Trump Accounts has risen above 7 million.

Over 2 million of those who have enrolled to date are eligible for the $1,000 seed fund from the federal government, which is available for children born between the start of 2025 and end of 2028 under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

Trump Accounts may also be created for children under the age of 18, although those who were born outside the 2025 to 2028 window aren’t eligible for the government’s seed money.

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Michael and Susan Dell announced a $6.25 billion contribution to seed Trump Accounts belonging to children under the age of 10. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/ AFP/Getty Images)

The Treasury spokeswoman also noted that since the launch there has been over $1.5 billion in investment contributions from individuals as well as contributions from pilot programs.

That figure doesn’t include philanthropic contributions, such as the $6.25 billion contributed by billionaires Michael and Susan Dell, who helped fund $250 initial seed deposits into accounts for children under age 10.

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