Couples all have their domestic routines and share of the chores. Who walks the dog, who puts the bin out?
But my partner and I have one that’s a little unusual. Once a week – on a Wednesday – we inject each other with the weight-loss drug Mounjaro.
There is a ritual and strange solemnity to this: the needle and syringe need to be prepared before we sterilise a patch on our stomachs with a swab.
Then the quick jab and measured dose of Mounjaro for one of us, before the other uses the same jab for his dose.
The first time we did this felt, frankly, like we were breaking the law. It was like we were taking illegal drugs rather than a prescription remedy.
But this September will see a seismic shift for those taking the weight-loss jab, as the price is set to spiral.
A few weeks ago the manufacturer Eli Lilly announced it was upping its wholesale prices by more than 170 per cent, an enormous cost increase that looks set to be passed on to all those using the drug and buying it privately.
Nick Maes started taking Mounjaro in February after unexpectedly bumping into a friend at a party who had lost weight on the drug
Although it’s since been reported that the company is trying to reduce the increase, I will be paying more, like everyone else. But for the last six months I’ve been paying, in effect, only half the recommended price for my jabs.
Let me explain.
I started taking Mounjaro in February after unexpectedly bumping into a once portly friend at a party.
He was quite dramatically transformed, but it was only after much quizzing that he reluctantly admitted his slimming secret to me. It was as if he were feeling guilty.
There is a widespread view that using the jabs is somehow ‘cheating’ – as Professor Julian Savulescu of Oxford University noted in a recent paper in the Journal of Medical Ethics, no less. But I was intrigued.
It should be said, I’m not the stereotypical weight-loss jab user; I wasn’t clinically obese nor had any other pressing need for the medication, such as diabetes. I was, however, getting porky.
Like lots of middle-aged men I’d quietly piled on the pounds over the years.
But I was in denial, I’d managed to kid myself that the weight gain was normal, even though I was the largest I’d ever been – barely fitting into a 34in waist trouser. Vanity got the better of me.
Getting the prescription was easily done: I claimed my weight was higher to the online pharmacy (I added a few kilos to ensure my BMI was well into the obese range), knocked a couple of inches off my height for good measure and took the most unflattering photo of myself slouching, piles of fat appearing to bulge over my waist band.
The initial 2.5mg dose of Mounjaro arrived a couple of days later – the first of my monthly subscription.
My jab journey has been no great secret hidden from my partner or my immediate friends.
And even though I had no qualms about ‘cheating’, those close to me questioned what they thought was a radical solution to a comparatively minor problem.
My plumpness was hardly a life-threatening condition; but to me it seemed insurmountable. I wanted to change it.
If fat jabs are the answer to the prayers of much larger people, then why shouldn’t they be the same for me? Why shouldn’t I get help to shed the excess pounds?
Within the first month of taking the medication, my weight began to drop and I became noticeably less jowly.
The effect was immediate, so much so that my partner decided he wanted to take it, too. Like me he’d piled on the pounds over the last few years.
Nick and his partner, who have been married for five years, now share doses of the drug
My next monthly dose had been automatically upped to 5mg, as happens with everyone, so we decided to share it.
Rather than shell out for two individual 2.5mg doses we reasoned that sharing one 5mg dose would be considerably cheaper than each paying £190 for a single jab and have the same effect. We’d have two for the price of one.
When I spoke to Dr Kath McCullough, special adviser on obesity at the Royal College of Physicians, she warned: ‘The issue here is that this is a medicine prescribed by a clinician based on the information supplied by a patient.
‘Important considerations such as past medical history, current medications, dose adjustments and side-effects are based on that one individual. We would strongly discourage sharing of any prescriptions or medication between people.’
But there was one other consideration too; my partner and I would have to share the needle.
This is clearly a risky thing to do, and all the medical advice says not to share the needle with other people – but we have been married for five years and to the best of our knowledge neither of us has any latent disease that might be transferrable. We felt that as the jab doesn’t go as deep as a vaccination but into your body fat that it was a risk we could take.
Unsurprisingly Dr McCullough strongly advises against the sharing of needles ‘due to the risk of spreading infection. These are clearly single-use needles which come sterilised for this very reason’.
And as my prescription went up each month – as is normal practice – from 5mg to 7.5mg and then 10mg, we continued sharing; each of us having only half the dosage prescribed.
The Mounjaro was having the desired effect.
The weight has fallen from us both, I have gone from 12st to 10st (I’m 5ft 10in tall), and a 35in waist to 30in over the last six months; the weight and body size I was always happy with before my middle-aged spread.
My partner is very pleased that he’s lost four inches from his waist and dropped well over a stone.
Fortunately taking this drug hasn’t changed anything too much in the kitchen. We’re both foodies and continue to enjoy our food, we just eat less of it. It might have been difficult had it just been me on the new regimen.
Experts warn of the dangers of sharing needles, but Nick says he has never felt better than while on the half dose
By sharing the dosage we have been, in effect, microdosing. Some people are actively seeking out pharmacists who will provide much smaller amounts of the drug – the idea is your appetite isn’t quite as suppressed, but enough so you still lose weight.
But the medical establishment is yet to be convinced about taking smaller quantities of the drug.
Alexander Miras, a clinical professor of medicine at Ulster University, told me: ‘Weight loss with all of these medications is dependent on the dose; the higher the dose the higher the weight loss.’
He warns: ‘If people reduce the dose they are taking by sharing it with someone else they are likely to regain some of the weight they have lost on the higher doses.’
But in my experience, the half dose has worked wonders. My excess baggage has disappeared and I’ve never felt better.
A spokesman for Eli Lilly told the Daily Mail: ‘Patient safety is our top priority. Patients should consult with their doctor or other healthcare professional on use of any prescription-only medicine, and follow the patient information leaflet and instructions for use.
‘The instructions for use states: “Do not share your Mounjaro KwikPen with other people, even if the pen needle has been changed. You may give other people a serious infection or get a serious infection from them.”’
