Can Ozempic Curb Cravings? What New Research Says About GLP-1 Drugs and Addiction

Ask anyone who has taken one of the new weight-loss shots what changed first, and many will tell you the same thing. It was not the scale. It was the noise. The constant pull toward the fridge, the snack drawer, the drive-thru, suddenly went quiet.

Now some of those same people are noticing something else went quiet too. The second glass of wine they stopped wanting. The cigarette they forgot about. Doctors started hearing these stories a few years ago and mostly filed them under “interesting.” That is changing. The research is catching up to the anecdotes, and it is starting to look like GLP-1 drugs may touch something deeper than hunger.

This week PBS NewsHour devoted an 11-minute segment to the emerging evidence that popular GLP-1 medications may help curb drug and alcohol cravings. Here is what the science actually shows so far, what it does not show yet, and why this could matter for a lot of families.

What GLP-1 Drugs Are and Why They Might Work on Addiction

GLP-1 receptor agonists mimic a natural gut hormone called glucagon-like peptide-1. The best known is semaglutide, sold as Ozempic for type 2 diabetes and Wegovy for weight loss. Others include liraglutide and dulaglutide, and newer cousins like tirzepatide act on more than one hormone pathway.

These drugs slow digestion and help control blood sugar, but they also act on receptors in the brain. That is the key. GLP-1 receptors sit in regions tied to reward and stress. Researchers believe the drugs may dampen dopamine signaling in the brain’s core reward center, which would make alcohol, nicotine or other drugs feel less rewarding. Same machinery, different craving.

Ziyad Al-Aly, a clinical epidemiologist at Washington University in St. Louis and the VA Saint Louis Health Care System, has a phrase for it. People on these drugs talk about losing “food noise.” He suspects some may be losing “drug noise” too, because the medication “is likely acting against the craving itself.”

How the Evidence Has Built Up

This did not start with one study. The first clues came from animals. In lab experiments described by Al-Aly in an essay republished by Fortune, rodents given GLP-1 drugs drank less alcohol, gave themselves less cocaine and showed less interest in nicotine. Vervet monkeys on semaglutide drank less alcohol without signs of nausea or changes in how much water they drank, which suggests the effect was not simply about feeling sick.

Then came large population studies. A nationwide Swedish study of about 227,000 people with alcohol use disorder found that people taking GLP-1 drugs had a 36% lower risk of alcohol-related hospitalization, compared with 14% for naltrexone, one of the standard approved treatments, according to Al-Aly’s summary. Other observational studies have linked GLP-1 use to fewer alcohol, cannabis and nicotine problems and lower opioid overdose risk.

Observational studies can point in a direction, but they cannot prove a drug caused the change. People who get prescribed one medication can differ in many ways from people who get another. That is why the field needed randomized trials, where chance decides who gets the drug and who gets a placebo. In 2026, those trials started to deliver.

The Lancet Trial: Semaglutide and Heavy Drinking

Anecdotes are a starting point. Randomized trials are where medicine gets serious. In May 2026, The Lancet published one of the most rigorous tests yet, led by Dr. Anders Fink-Jensen of Copenhagen University Hospital with co-authors that included two top NIH figures: Dr. George Koob, director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, and Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Here is how it worked, according to the NIH summary:

• 108 adults seeking treatment for alcohol use disorder who also had obesity were enrolled. 88 finished the study.
• Participants got a weekly injection of either semaglutide or a placebo for 26 weeks.
• Everyone was offered standard cognitive behavioral therapy for alcohol use disorder.

Both groups cut back on heavy drinking days, which shows therapy works. But the semaglutide group cut back significantly more. They also reported bigger drops in total monthly drinking, drinks per drinking day and self-reported cravings. Blood markers of alcohol use and liver damage improved more too. And, not surprisingly, they lost more weight.

The side effects were familiar to anyone who has taken these drugs: mostly mild to moderate nausea, constipation, loss of appetite and other stomach trouble. One person on semaglutide had a side effect serious enough to require hospitalization.

Volkow summed it up with typical scientific restraint: “Questions remain but this is nonetheless very encouraging.”

The Veterans Study: 600,000 People, Five Substances

Trials are small by design. To see the bigger picture, Al-Aly’s team turned to the health records of U.S. veterans. Their study, published in The BMJ in March 2026 and described by WashU Medicine, followed 606,434 veterans with type 2 diabetes for up to three years. It compared people who started a GLP-1 drug with people who started a different diabetes drug, an SGLT2 inhibitor.

Among about 525,000 veterans with no history of substance use disorder, GLP-1 users had a lower risk of developing one:

• Any substance use disorder: 14% lower
• Alcohol: 18% lower
• Cannabis: 14% lower
• Cocaine: 20% lower
• Nicotine: 20% lower
• Opioids: 25% lower

The numbers were even more striking among about 81,600 veterans who already had a substance use disorder. Over three years, GLP-1 users had about 30% fewer emergency room visits, 25% fewer hospitalizations, 40% fewer overdoses and 50% fewer drug-related deaths. In absolute terms, that worked out to roughly 12 fewer serious events per 1,000 people treated.

Al-Aly’s big idea is that addiction treatment might shift from fighting one substance at a time to “targeting that common biologic signal” that drives craving across all of them.

Why This Matters Right Now

The need is huge. Only three medications are approved by the FDA to treat alcohol use disorder, and many people who could benefit never get them. For methamphetamine and cocaine addiction, there are no approved medications at all.

On Oct. 2, the World Health Organization released its latest Global Health Estimates, and one line stood out for Americans. From 2000 to 2023, the Americas saw the largest increases of any region in deaths and lost healthy years from drug use disorders. The same report found anxiety and depression burdens rising sharply since 2019.

That is the backdrop for why researchers, doctors and families are paying attention. A medication millions of people already take for diabetes or weight could, if the evidence holds, become one more tool for people fighting addiction. For anyone who has watched a loved one struggle, as we explored in our piece on faith and addiction recovery, more tools matter.

The Big Caveats

This is where honesty matters more than hype. The evidence is promising, not proven, and here is why:

• Not approved for addiction. No GLP-1 drug is FDA-approved to treat alcohol or drug use disorders. Using them for that purpose would be off-label and should only happen under a doctor’s care.
• The veterans study is observational. It shows a strong association, not proof of cause. People who start one drug versus another can differ in ways researchers cannot fully adjust for.
• Specific populations. The Lancet trial enrolled people with obesity. The VA study looked at veterans with diabetes. Researchers say more trials are needed to know whether results hold for people without those conditions.
• Unknown long-term effects. Nobody knows yet whether cravings return when people stop the drug, or how the brain adapts to years of use. Al-Aly has also noted that because these drugs act on reward circuitry, it is worth studying whether long-term use affects motivation in some people.
• Side effects and cost. Stomach problems are common, and the drugs remain expensive for many patients without coverage.

The good news is that more than a dozen additional trials are underway or enrolling, according to Al-Aly. Within a few years, the answers should be much clearer.

What Families Should Take From This

If someone in your family is struggling with alcohol or drugs, the message is not “get them on Ozempic.” The message is that addiction is increasingly understood as a biological problem with biological levers, not just a failure of willpower. That shift alone can lower the shame that keeps people from asking for help, something we have written about in our look at men’s mental health and real help.

Talk to a doctor. Ask about the medications that are already approved, like naltrexone, and about therapy, which worked for both groups in the Lancet trial. If a loved one is already on a GLP-1 for diabetes or weight, it is worth mentioning any changes in drinking or cravings to their physician. That information helps doctors and, collectively, helps science.

The shots that changed how America thinks about weight may end up changing how we think about craving itself. That is a story worth following, carefully.