"Take Wegovy and Live 10 Years Longer?"... An 'Unexpected Study' Suggests Improvements in Muscle Strength and Memory [Health Talk]

[Financial News] An animal study has found that Semaglutide, the active ingredient in the obesity treatment Wegovy, may do more than promote weight loss and could potentially slow the aging process itself.

According to a study published on the 7th in the international journal Nature, an international research team from the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley), the University of Copenhagen and other institutions analyzed the aging-related effects of Semaglutide in 20-month-old female mice. In human terms, 20 months of age is equivalent to a person in their 60s.
The 40 mice given Semaglutide daily had a median lifespan of 834 days. That was 92 days, or about 12%, longer than the 742 days recorded for the 39 mice in the saline-treated control group.
If this increase is simply applied to British women with a life expectancy of about 83 years, it would amount to nine to 10 years. That would mean living past the age of 90.

The mice did not merely live longer. Those given the drug moved more actively in a new environment, and their physical abilities also improved, including their ability to maintain balance on a rotating rod, grip strength while hanging from a wire mesh, and running endurance. Changes were also observed in cognitive functions such as spatial memory.
In the body, chronic inflammation, cellular senescence, stem cell depletion, genomic instability and declining mitochondrial function were alleviated. In the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus, the brain region responsible for memory and learning, neural stem cell activity and the production of new neurons increased.
The key question was whether these changes resulted from the drug itself or from eating less because of reduced appetite.
In a separate experiment, the research team compared mice given Semaglutide with mice whose food calories were reduced by 24% over five months. The degree of calorie restriction was matched to the amount by which the treated mice reduced their own food intake after receiving the drug.
The two groups lost similar amounts of weight, and several physiological indicators were also similar. The difference emerged afterward.
The Semaglutide group showed improvements over baseline in exploratory behavior, spatial memory and blood sugar regulation. By contrast, the calorie-restricted group generally maintained its previous levels.
Their metabolic responses also differed. Oxygen consumption and energy expenditure fell in the calorie-restricted group, while the Semaglutide group maintained a normal metabolic rate.

The research team concluded that Semaglutide’s effects may not stem solely from reduced food intake and could also act independently on biological processes related to aging.
Semaglutide is a glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist and the active ingredient in the obesity treatment Wegovy and the diabetes treatment Ozempic. It promotes insulin secretion to regulate blood sugar and increases feelings of fullness, thereby suppressing appetite.
The drug has previously been reported to be effective against various conditions, including cardiovascular, kidney and liver diseases. The research team focused on the possibility that aging processes may underlie the way a single drug can affect multiple diseases at the same time.
Rafael de Cabo, a senior researcher at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), said, "Most chronic diseases are deeply rooted in the aging process." He explained that if GLP-1 drugs actually delay aging, they could produce multiple health benefits at the same time.
However, it is difficult to apply these findings directly to humans. The experiment involved elderly female mice, and humans and mice differ substantially in their physiology, lifespan and living environments.
It has not yet been determined whether the same effects occur in male mice or whether long-term use by humans would actually extend lifespan or healthspan.
[email protected] Minseo Seong Reporter