[topgrain2]

The drug is more likely to work long-term. Diet & exercise, as a treatment plan, are distressingly ineffective.

Well-studied problem.

It makes more sense when you realize that something like sheer dieting/exercising willpower isn't why some populations are skinnier than others. Pick another country with a healthier-weight population, start placing some of them in the US, and they'll gain weight. Put them back, and it'll drop again.

If "just diet and exercise" (the advice, and individual effort to that effect) aren't what are keeping some populations skinnier, why would it cure a population with an obesity epidemic?

[hack1312]

So clearly it’s something to do with the difference in their lives in the USA, but your first response is to treat the symptom with drugs rather than look at their life holistically?

Just off the top of my head the food (portions, quality, etc) in the USA combined with how much people no longer can walk vs being required to drive are a huge contributor to weight gain of immigrants to the USA.