Anti-obesity drugs such as semaglutide (Ozempic, Wegovy), are showing potential beyond obesity treatment. Research increasingly suggests that these drugs may help manage alcohol use disorder and alcohol-related liver disease by reducing the desire to drink. New evidence now indicates that they could also directly protect the liver itself.
In a study published on September 18 in npj Metabolic Health and Disease, researchers at the Yale School of Medicine discovered that GLP-1 receptor agonists, the class of drugs that includes semaglutide, reduce the activity of a liver enzyme responsible for breaking down alcohol. This effect lowers the production of harmful alcohol byproducts in experimental models.
“This is the first time that GLP-1 receptor agonists have been shown to regulate alcohol metabolism in the liver,” says principal investigator Wajahat Mehal, MD, professor of medicine (digestive diseases) at YSM. “If you’re taking semaglutide, then your body will likely handle alcohol differently.”
However, because the drugs slow alcohol metabolism, the team also observed that they lead to higher blood alcohol concentrations.
“If these results are reproduced in humans, people using GLP-1 receptor agonists might be drinking an amount of alcohol that does not normally put them above the legal blood alcohol level, but because they are taking this drug, it does,” says Mehal.
He emphasized that further human studies are needed to fully understand how these medications affect alcohol processing.
