Melissa McCarthy is asked about the Ozempic in public by Barbra Streisand.

A comment made by Barbra Streisand on an Instagram post shared by Melissa McCarthy has sparked discussion about weight, shaming and the increasingly widespread use of drugs for weight loss. McCarthy, 53, shared two photos of herself attending a festival in Los Angeles over the weekend with director Adam Shankman on her Instagram page on Sunday.

“Give him my regards,” Streisand, 82, said in response to McCarthy’s images in the comments section, referencing Shankman. She then asked, “Did you take Ozempic?” The now-deleted comment from Streisand was seen by Comments By Celebs on Instagram, where the user wrote, “Babs!!” and shared a screenshot of the exchange. In a follow-up post on her Instagram Story a few hours later, Streisand publicly addressed the comment, writing, “OMG – I went on Instagram to see pictures of the beautiful flowers I received on my birthday! Underneath them was a picture of my friend Melissa McCarthy, who I sang with on my Encore album. She looked fabulous! I just wanted to compliment her. I forgot the world was reading!”

McCarthy and Streisand have worked together in the past, including a duet performance in 2016.

Streisand’s comment, which was left from her verified Instagram account, soon sparked a debate on social media about the shaming around medications used for weight loss, including Ozempic.

Ozempic and Monjaro are both approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat type 2 diabetes, but some doctors prescribe the drug “off-label” for weight loss, as permitted by the FDA.

Wegovy and Zepbound, which contain the same active ingredients as Ozempic and Monjaro, respectively, are both FDA-approved as weight loss management treatments for people with obesity or who are overweight with at least one related underlying condition, such as high blood pressure.

As the landscape of obesity medicine has changed over the past two years, people’s perception of obesity as a chronic medical condition has also changed.

What is Ozempic? How does Ozempic work?

The fact that there is a medically accepted prescription for managing weight and being healthy in my lifetime feels like a relief, like redemption, like a gift, and not something to hide behind and be ridiculed once again,” Winfrey said when she first publicly confirmed she was using a medication to help maintain her weight.

While McCarthy has spoken publicly about her weight journey and her experiences with body shaming in the past, she has not spoken publicly about Ozempic or other medications for weight loss.

McCarthy added, “There has to be more. There are more interesting things about women than their buttocks or their this or that. It may not be the first question every time, or it may not be a question at all.”

What doctors say about weight and shame

Obesity experts say the topic of weight has such a grip on society, perhaps because it’s so universal and so visible that people can see weight loss or gain.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, obesity is a medical condition that affects about 42% of people in the U.S. Obesity has been linked to conditions such as stroke and heart attack, high blood pressure, breathing difficulties, sleep apnea and increased risk of premature death.

“The reality is that, yes, obesity is a disease, but unlike other diseases, you can see it. “That’s part of the problem. And it’s not a disease that affects one in a million. It affects 42% of adult Americans,” Dr. Caroline Apovian, an endocrinologist and co-director of the Center for Weight Management and Wellness at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, told ABC News.

Apovian said the fact that obesity affects so many people makes it feel more accessible to talk about, even though it’s a medical condition that provides confidentiality.

The active ingredient in Monjaro and Zepbound, tirzepatide, works by activating two hormone receptors: GLP-1 and glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide, or GIP.

The active component of Ozempic and Wegovy, semaglutide, functions by selectively activating the GLP-1 receptor.

“I think a lot of people don’t realize that every single human being who was ever born and lived has GLP-1 in their body,” Stanford stated.”

Those of us who are lean as a baseline have more GLP-1 at baseline. Those of us who are not born with that privilege need it more, and maybe they get it in the form of medication.”

Stanford said it’s wrong to criticize or question people who use medications to lose weight because doing so is blaming them for “something wrong with their physiology.”

“I don’t care if you’re a celebrity or an average patient, but I don’t think we should judge people based on that,” Stanford said.