FRIDAY, May 8, 2026 (NewsDay News) – Despite a sharp increase in the use of glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonists, most U.S. adults with severe obesity remain untreated, according to a study presented at the May 7, 2026, annual meeting of the American Metabolic Society. Antonio.
Ruth Laverde, MD, of the University of California, San Diego, and colleagues reviewed trends in bariatric surgery and GLP-1 receptor agonist use among adults with severe obesity (body mass index ≥35 kg/m).2) without diabetes using electronic health record data (Epic Cosmos; 2016 to 2024), representing approximately 34.2 million US patients.
The researchers found that the rate of bariatric surgery increased from 0.03% in 2016 to 0.24% in 2023, with a slight downward trend to 0.21% in 2024. At the same time, the use of GLP-1 receptor agonists has steadily increased, increasing from 0.02% to 2%. 2024. This translates into an increase from less than 4,600 prescriptions in 2018 to more than 1.4 million in 2025. However, 94.4 percent of severely obese patients did not receive treatment.
“Obesity treatment in the U.S. is well-known, but it’s amazing to see the scale of this database — tens of millions are incurable despite numerous effective treatments,” Laverde said in a statement.
