What happens when you stop

Roughly 60% of what you lose comes back within a year of stopping. That figure should be on every price table in this market and is on almost none.

The honest answer is that most people regain a substantial share of what they lost. A 2026 analysis published in PMC modelled the trajectory and identified a regain curve in which roughly 60% of the weight lost during treatment is regained within a year of stopping. Harvard Health, AARP and several academic medical centres have published similar guidance through 2026.

Why the desk prints it

Because it determines which number you should be comparing. If this is ongoing therapy rather than a course, the relevant figure is not the monthly price or even the annual one — it is the multi-year total, and on our board the spread across five years runs into five figures.

Why it happens

These drugs work by changing appetite signalling — that is the whole mechanism. Stop the drug and the signalling returns to roughly where it was, including what many people describe as "food noise" coming back. It is not a failure of willpower; it is the medication no longer doing the thing it was doing.

If you need to stop

• Talk to your prescriber first rather than simply not reordering — particularly if you take other medications that were adjusted around the GLP-1.
• Do not restart at your old dose after a long gap. Tolerance fades, and restarting high is how people get very unwell.
• Expect appetite to return before the weight does, which many people find the hardest part.
• A planned taper with support is a different experience from running out of medication because a supplier failed.

This is general information drawn from published research and clinical guidance, not medical advice. Decisions about stopping, tapering or maintenance belong with the clinician who prescribed it.