Stars Who've Spoken About Ozempic — and What They've Said

One of the hottest topics in Hollywood lately is the type 2 diabetes drug Ozempic and its fellow semaglutide, obesity drug Wegovy. The use of either prescription — which Dr. Ania Jastreboff tells PEOPLE are "nutrient-stimulated, hormone-based medications" that target the brain — leads to weight loss, and because of that, some people who don't necessarily need the drugs are using them to slim down.

"The Hollywood trend is concerning," Dr. Caroline Apovian, co-director of the Center for Weight Management and Wellness at the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, tells PEOPLE. "We're not talking about stars who need to lose 10 lbs. We're talking about people who are dying of obesity, are going to die of obesity."

Read on for what stars have said about the meds, which are currently in short supply.

"Sounds like it's a slay honey, 'cause girls have been out here killin' it with it, but for me, I would say 'Nay' because I always feel like when something sounds too good to be true — it usually is."

She continued, "It might do something and then next think you know, I've got something growing, you know, under my armpits, like I don't know where... where you pushing this fat at, where you taking, where you pulling from — I don't want any side effects, so — but the girls are killin' it."

- during a round of "Slay or Nay" for PEOPLE's Beautiful Issue.

While attending the Time100 gala in New York City on April 26, the Top Chef host shared her thoughts on the rising popularity of Ozempic and the possible reasons behind it.

"You gotta be careful what you do with your body," she said. "On Top Chef I eat a lot, and I understand the tendency. But also the pressure for women in media is much different than men in media. So we have to maybe look deeper to the reasons why, as a society, not just put it on the shoulders of the women who just want the same opportunity that men get."

"We just want an equal shake," she continued. "We have to look good, we have to sound good, we have to be strong but not too strong, we have to be vulnerable but not too weak. And it can feel like a really dichotomous, tall order."

"So, I think we have to be kinder to each other and to ourselves," Lakshmi added.

"Let's not discredit my years of working out. I get up 5 days a week at 6am to train. Please stop with your assumptions. I guess new year still means mean people."

— responding to an Instagram user who suggested she was on Ozempic

"WTF"

- on her Instagram Story, in response to photos of semaglutide advertisements posted inside a New York City subway station, per The Independent

Speaking to Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live, Catania admitted that she "got on the bandwagon" and started taking Ozempic.

"I wasn't going to come to [the] reunion looking bigger than anyone else," the Real Housewives of New Jersey star explained. Cohen asked if she'd experienced any side effect from taking the drug. "No, just not hungry," she said.

"All these people are coming for me saying that I take the weight-loss things … people are saying that I'm taking Ozempic. I'm not, and I never have. I would never do that. There are diabetics that need it."

-to Entertainment Tonight in March 2023

The TV personality wrote in an op-ed for the Daily Mail that she was being "urged" to use Ozempic just four weeks after giving birth, something she found "horrifying."

Among other things, McCain wrote, "I was even offered a black market freebie by someone with 'extra shots at home.' ... Let me make one thing very clear. I'm not taking it. I refuse. There's a clear moral issue here. It's hard to take a drug because swimsuit season is around the corner, while others need it to stay alive. And how can this be healthy?"

She concluded that her focus is on body positivity and overall health, writing, "There ain't nothing worth having that's easy to get."

The Biggest Loser trainer told PEOPLE she has "taken at least eight family friends' parents off of this drug" as a result of some of the side effects they've experienced, and tried to steer them to lifestyle changes to lose the weight instead. "The truth of the matter is, Ozempic has some pretty significant side effects," she added. "Do your homework on it. The results are not lasting, in very large part,"

"This is the Hollywood drug ... It's nationwide. I have friends in Miami, I have friends in New York who are doing it."

— to the Wall Street Journal in October 2022, before opening up about her own experience with Ozempic and Mounjaro on the Behind the Velvet Rope podcast in February 2023

"I say everyone do what you want to do. Understand the risks, and if it's right for you, it's right for you. I think the expectations [for women to be thin] are always going be there whether or not there's like this miracle drug or not. The pressures are always going to be there. So thanks, Hollywood, thanks media, thanks society for keeping it going. But I just think, you know, if it makes you happy, follow your bliss."

— to PEOPLE at the premiere of Vanderpump Rules season 10

"Stop taking it for weight loss. Enough already. I think that Hollywood is all sorts of f—ed up. We've got to do better. I think there's a lot of things that need to change and it starts with us and there are times where I roll my eyes and say, 'F—ing do better, all of us. We all need to participate in becoming better examples for our children in the outside world."

— to PEOPLE at the premiere of Vanderpump Rules season 10

"I cannot stand people saying [I'm taking Ozempic] because people that know me know that I'm up every day at like 5:30 a.m. 6 a.m. at the latest… I'm in the gym for two hours. I really put a lot of effort into my diet and exercise and taking care of myself, so when people like to think I took the easy way out, it's frustrating."

— to Extra at the American Heart Association's Go Red for Women Red Dress Collection concert in New York City, after she recently clapped back at commenters who suspected she's using the drug after posing a bikini selfie

"My anti-aging doctor just hands it out to anybody. I didn't even know I was on it. She said, 'If you ever want to drop five lbs., this is good.'

"I came back from a vacation and I injected myself with it. I went to lunch with a girlfriend a few days later, and she was like, 'I'm not really eating anything. I'm so nauseous, I'm on Ozempic.' And I was like, 'I'm kind of nauseous too.' But I had just come back from Spain and was jet-lagged.

"I'm not on it anymore. That's too irresponsible. I'm an irresponsible drug user, but I'm not gonna take a diabetic drug. I tried it, and I'm not gonna do that. That's not for me. That's not right for me.

"I've injected about four or five of my friends with Ozempic because I realized I didn't wanna use it cause it's silly. It's for heavy people. Everyone is on Ozempic. It's gonna backfire, something bad is gonna happen."

— on Alex Cooper's Call Her Daddy podcast

"[My doctors] said I need this. And I had a lot of mixed feelings. A few months later I went off it and got into the bad binging.

"I saw a doctor and they were like, it's 100 percent because I went on Ozempic. It was making me think I wasn't hungry for so long, I lost some weight. I didn't wanna be obsessed with being on it long term. I was like, I bet the second I got off I'm gonna get starving again. I did, and my binging got so much worse. So then I kind of blamed Ozempic. [I] gained double the weight back."

— on Amanda Hirsch's Not Skinny But Not Fat podcast

"An eating disorder in a needle. [It's] sad and sickening. [I] can't imagine what will happen if people need to suddenly stop."

— on Instagram

"I'm horrified by it. I'm not so much horrified by people wanting to lose weight — that has always been a universal thing — but I'm very very scared of what will happen if and when people have to go off this drug.

"It's just going to be a massive number of people who gain a huge amount of weight and suddenly don't know what to do with themselves. I'm just afraid of that day. There's going to be a lot of people with eating disorders. You start dropping massive amounts of weight. That's so addicting. That's how I spiraled into anorexia. You get addicted to this new body and to the attention that comes with it.

"A lot of people in the Housewives world are on Ozempic. A lot of my friends are in the Housewives world, so it was tough for me to come back and suddenly no one's eating when we go out to dinner."

— on the Page Six Virtual Reali-Tea podcast

"Everyone is suddenly showing up 25 pounds lighter. What happens when they stop taking #Ozempic ?????"

— on Twitter

"Fasting ... And Wegovy."

— replying to a Twitter user asking for his "secret" to looking "healthy"

"I have said what I have said about the potential harm of people using the diabetes medication for weight loss only. I fear for everyone in the next few years. Rich people are buying this stuff off prescription for upwards of 1000 dollars. Actual diabetics are seeing shortages. It's a now mainstream craze in Hollywood. HOPE this doesn't end the same way we were told opioids were safe. There is little to no discussion of the side effects in any advertising online. I'm deeply concerned but I can't change any of your minds because fat phobia has our generation in a chokehold.

"I'm screaming into a void. I'm seeing people really struggle because of this stuff. It has become the exact uncontrollable wave I thought it would become and I hope that I'm worried for no reason, and that my doctors who have been advising me on this stuff are wrong, and that in 2 years nobody is saying 'F--- she was right and she tried to warn us for 6 months.'

"Wishing you all well and hope you have doctors that care about more than your size."

— on Instagram