Why People Are Losing Faith in Healthcare

The U.S. healthcare system is failing not because of inefficiency, but because it's fundamentally designed to profit from chronic disease—especially obesity, which drives 80% of healthcare costs. In a groundbreaking conversation with David Ricks, CEO of Eli Lilly, Scott Galloway argues that GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and ZepBound are not just weight-loss tools but a revolutionary medical intervention that could reduce cancer risk, curb alcohol and gambling addiction, and dramatically lower long-term healthcare spending. Ricks reveals that Lilly’s success—becoming the first pharmaceutical company to hit a trillion-dollar valuation—wasn’t due to luck, but a bold bet on obesity as a treatable, scalable condition in 2018, when no one else was. The company’s competitive edge lies in speed, scale, and a culture of execution that prioritizes solving problems for millions over niche, high-priced treatments. Despite high list prices, Lilly has slashed costs through direct-to-consumer pricing and Medicaid deals, with Medicare access starting at $50/month in July. The episode also exposes the dangerous rise of unregulated 'peptide' supplements online, warning that they’re not medicine but untested, potentially harmful substances. Ricks concludes that the real crisis isn’t healthcare—it’s the system’s failure to empower people with control over their health, a void now being filled by self-directed, science-backed tools like GLP-1s.