Music

Fat Joe Says He Uses Ozempic for 200-Pound Weight Loss

The rapper previously weighed nearly 500 pounds.

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Another celebrity is crediting Ozempic to help with weight loss. Rapper Fat Joe is the latest to reveal his use of the prescription drug. As a diabetic, Joe said he had to make drastic changes to his diet, which primarily involved cutting carbs. He also uses Ozempic to aid in his long term maintenance.

“We just try to eat everything with the least carbs as possible,” he exclusively told Us Weekly. “So we try to stay away from the bread, the pasta, the rice. That’s the smartest way to eat.”

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Like most people, he loves carbs, but indulges in minimal portions. “Like this morning I ate breakfast, I had this toast. I cut the corner off, ate it and kept it moving,” he shared. “Normally I would’ve ate [sic] the whole thing. But you know, that’s what we do. We cut carbs and try to be smarter.” As for the Ozempic, he joked: “Ozempic says you may only have two pieces of your favorite stuff.” 

Ozempic is an FDA-approved prescription medication for people with type 2 diabetes. It works in the brain to impact satiety, which makes people who use it feel full quickly and not overindulge. 

The Bronx native said he weighed 470 pounds at his heaviest. He became inspired to lose weight after fellow Terror Squad rapper and longtime friend Big Pun died in 2000 at just 28 years old. The rapper died of a heart attack which he suffered at a New York hotel. At the time of his death, he weighed 698 pounds. “I went to his funeral and I felt like Ebenezer Scrooge, like, I seen me,” Joe told Men’s Health in 2023. “I said, ‘You gotta lose weight; otherwise you outta here.’”

Despite Joe’s smaller frame, he has no plans of changing his stage name. “My wife would kill me. She likes me being a big boy,” he said. He wed Lorena Cartagena in 1995. They share a daughter, and he has two sons from previous relationships. “She hallucinates like I’m still that big boy,” he said. “She loves that.”