More than two million people are thought to be using fat jabs in the UK, with two in three Britons now classed as overweight or obese.
However, trials have shown that without a change in lifestyle, people may be forced to stay on the drugs for life to avoid gaining all the weight back.
Now, patients who prove they have started going to the gym or jogging could be offered cut-price weight loss jabs from Boots.
The pharmacy has partnered with health insurance firm Vitality to offer the drugs to patients who make a step towards a healthier lifestyle.
Members of Vitality currently earn points based on their daily step count, gym visits or activities such as ParkRun.
Those points will now be able to be used for discounts on weight-loss jabs from the Boots Online Doctor service.
Patients on the highest dose of Mounjaro could save around £1,000 a year on the jabs, which currently cost around £335 a month.
The scheme is open to Vitality members through private health insurance or workplace schemes.
Members will get a minimum of 10 per cent off any weight loss jabs, which could rise to as much as 25 per cent.
Vitality currently rewards members with healthier lifestyles through a tiered status, from Bronze, Silver and Gold to Platinum.
Patients who prove they have started going to the gym or jogging could be offered cut-price weight loss jabs from Boots
Discounts on weight loss jabs will increase for higher level members, with Silver members receiving a 15 per cent discount, 20 per cent for Gold and 25 per cent for Platinum members.
The scheme has been rolled out to incentivise people to make healthy lifestyle changes to decrease their chances of putting the weight back on.
Trials show that patients who give up the jabs regain nearly all of their weight back, unless they have made alterations to their lifestyle.
Jamie Kerruish, the chief healthcare officer at Boots, told The Times: ‘Having this discount structure in place makes weight-loss medication a bit more accessible, and also gives you that behavioural nudge to become more healthy.’
Dr Katie Tryon, the deputy chief executive for Vitality Health, said that exercise increased the health benefits of weight-loss jabs.
She said: ‘We’ve got lots of evidence to show that if you start losing weight, it becomes easier to exercise.
‘There is this wonderful flywheel effect. It’s really important that you’re doing all these healthy things, and not just thinking, ‘well, it’s fine, I’m on medication to lose weight’.’
A major Oxford review in January found that when the jabs are stopped, weight returns rapidly – regardless of how much is lost.
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Patients on the highest dose of Mounjaro could save around £1,000 a year on the jabs, which currently cost around £335 a month.
Professor Susan Jebb, co-author of the study and adviser to ministers and the NHS on obesity, suggested people may need a lifetime solution – such as jabs or behaviour change support or both – to tackle obesity in the long-term.
She said: ‘Obesity is a chronic relapsing condition, and I think one would expect that these treatments need to be continued for life, just in the same way as blood pressure medication.’
The jabs, known collectively as GLP-1 drugs, work by mimicking hormones released after eating.
However, experts warn that withdrawing this hormonal ‘fix’ can leave users vulnerable to rebound hunger.
‘As soon as the drug is stopped, appetite is no longer kept in check,’ said Dr Adam Collins, an associate professor of nutrition who was not involved in the study.
England’s Chief Medical Officer, Professor Chris Whitty warned that weight loss jabs are not the solution to Britain’s obesity crisis.
Professor Whitty said it would represent a ‘societal failure’ if drugs such as Mounjaro and Wegovy were relied upon to tackle rising obesity rates, warning there is still ‘a lot we don’t know’ about the long-term effects of the treatments.
He said: ‘They are very good drugs but there’s a lot we don’t know about GLP-1s. Very small numbers of people have very bad reactions to them and a large number of people have unpleasant side effects.
‘For people who need them they are transformational, and some people will always need them, but it should be a small minority. If it’s a high proportion of people then I think that is a societal failure.
‘Relying on these drugs seems to me to be the wrong answer.’
