Whoopi Goldberg, 68, Used Mounjaro After Hitting Nearly 300 Pounds
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Weight-loss medications have been a hot topic for months, with celebrities like Oprah, Sharon Osbourne and more opening up about using them to shed pounds. Now, Whoopi Goldberg just revealed that she also used a popular drug to slim down after reaching a weight that concerned her.
The 68-year-old shared the news on The View during a discussion about Oprah’s new special, Shame, Blame and the Weight Loss Revolution. “My weight has come and gone and up and down, but it’s never been an issue for me because I don’t listen to what other people say about me," she said.
But, after gaining weight during a near-fatal health scare, Whoopi said she used Mounjaro to feel like herself again. Here's what she shared.
She weighed nearly 300 pounds during the making of ‘Till.’
Whoopi realized she had gained weight during the making of Till in 2022. In the film, Whoopi played Mamie Till-Bradley, an educator who wanted justice after the murder of her 14-year-old son Emmett in August 1955. She also produced the movie.
"I will tell you, I weighed almost 300 pounds when I made Till," she said.
She was recovering from a near-fatal health scare.
Till was shot not long after Whoopi recovered from a scary health incident. After catching what she thought was the common cold, the host landed in the hospital and was diagnosed with pneumonia in both lungs.
The EGOT winner also had sepsis, a life-threatening complication in which the body responds improperly to an infection, per The Mayo Clinic. Instead of fighting the disease, the body turns on itself, causing organs to work poorly.
To treat the diagnoses, Whoopi was prescribed steroids and a number of medications. But the drugs had some adverse side effects.
“I had taken all those steroids, I was on all this stuff,” she shared, noting that she didn’t realize that she had gained weight until she looked at herself in the mirror one day. “I just always felt like me. And then I saw me and I thought, ‘Oh! That’s a lot of me!’”
She has used diabetes drug Mounjaro to lose weight.
Whoopi shared that she used a weight-loss medication to shed the pounds. “One of the things that’s helped me dropped the weight was the Mounjaro. That’s what I used,” she said. (Whoopi’s The View cohost, Sunny Hostin, also shared that she used Mounjaro to lose weight after gaining 40 pounds during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.)
Mounjaro is a medication designed to control blood sugar levels in patients with type 2 diabetes. However, the medication has also been used off-label for weight loss. The active ingredient in Mounjaro, tirzepatide, has since been FDA-approved for weight loss under the name Zepbound.
Mounjaro is similar to fellow diabetes drug Ozempic, which is also used off-label for weight loss. But, there are a few key differences: The active ingredient in Ozempic is semaglutide, while the active ingredient in Mounjaro is tirzepatide. (Both work to increase insulin production.) Research has found that tirzepatide helps patients lose more weight by targeting an additional receptor.
Ultimately, Whoopi urged people to be kinder to each other concerning the subjects of weight and weight loss. “Maybe the key is to stop judging everybody. Maybe that’s the key,” she said.
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