ATLANTA — Two more countries are following Europe and demanding that GLP-1 weight loss drugs warn of possible blindness.
Last month, Channel 2 Action News told you about a Georgia woman who said it happened to her.
Channel 2 Investigative Reporter Sophia Choi talked to her about why she’s urging the U.S. to take action.
“My vision’s just not what it was,” Diane Wirth said.
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Wirth, a former Grady Memorial Hospital nurse practitioner, says she woke up one morning just a few weeks after starting Wegovy in 2025 and could not see out of her right eye.
“It was heartbreaking, it was jarring. I was angry,” she said.
Doctors diagnosed her with NAION, often called an eye stroke, caused by reduced blood flow to the optic nerve.
“Once it happens, it’s permanent. There’s no going back,” Wirth said.
Wirth says she was never warned about the possibility of blindness before taking the drug. Now, she’s part of a federal multi-district lawsuit alleging drugmakers failed to warn patients about the risk.
“It comes on suddenly, you don’t feel it, and then it’s permanent,” attorney Jason Goldstein said.
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The lawsuit relies in part on a 2024 JAMA Ophthalmology study that found an association between semaglutide drugs and NAION.
Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly dispute that there’s a proven causal link.
“The evidence does not establish a causal relationship between GLP-1 RAs and NAION,” Lilly said.
Novo Nordisk says a review of more than 96,000 patients found no increased risk.
“In Europe, the label has been updated for semaglutide,” Goldstein said.
While the FDA has not added a NAION warning to U.S. labels, regulators in other countries have taken action.
First in Europe, where it’s on the warning label. Canada updated safety information for Ozempic and Mounjaro this summer to address NAION. Australia also recently updated warning information, telling patients to seek immediate care for sudden vision loss.
For Wirth, the debate is personal. Losing her eyesight meant losing her job and her independence.
“If I would’ve read that there was a possibility I could lose my vision, I would’ve never taken this drug,” Wirth said.
The FDA told Channel 2 Action News that it is continuing to evaluate the potential safety of GLP-1s.
The CDC said that people taking these weight loss drugs may want to see an ophthalmologist before starting.
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