You can’t deny the buzz. Credit Suisse analyst Trung Huynh has combed social media and is impressed by the awareness — and demand — for GLP-1 drugs like Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro. “While we caution that the submissions may have respondent bias and the comments are in the public domain and unverified, we have analyzed and prepared an archive of the most interesting observations that we believe provide an alternative perspective to the traditional data,” Huynh said. in a research note on Thursday. Among these observations are reports of other potential benefits that patients taking Mounjaro or tirsepatide are seeing. To summarize, Mounjaro has been approved as a treatment for type 2 diabetes, but the drug is expected to be approved by the US Food and Drug Administration, possibly by the end of this year, for the treatment of obesity and overweight. Patients enrolled in the Eli Lilly trials lost up to 20% or more of their original weight while taking the drug, which exceeds the results of other available drugs. The company is also conducting several other studies to investigate the use of tirzepatide to treat other conditions, such as sleep apnea. Huynh said he’s seen posts on social media where people with sleep apnea say they were able to get better sleep or stop using a CPAP machine after losing weight on Mounjaro. Others using the drug have reported benefits such as a reduction in addictive behaviors such as smoking, drinking, gambling, and shopping, among others. “Although relatively unsurprising given the literature suggesting that GLP agonism suppresses hedonic food intake via a reward pathway in the brain, we are very interested in the potentially far-reaching effect beyond obesity and T2D,” said Huynh. He noted that other comments suggested using the drug to treat infertility and polycystic ovary syndrome, a condition that overlaps 50% to 60% with obesity. Although Eli Lilly has not said it is investigating this indication, Novo Nordisk — which has a competing GLP-1 drug, semaglutide — has registered a new trial to evaluate it. The biggest point of caution is the chatter on social media that suggests health insurance providers are becoming more restrictive in reimbursement. But that may be a function of patients trying to use Munjaro off-label for obesity, he said. GLP-1 drugs carry hefty price tags. To help with the payments, Eli Lilly is offering a $575 coupon that expires at the end of the year, Huynh said. Credit Suisse has an outperform rating on Eli Lilly shares with a price target of $490, which represents a more than 9% upside from the stock’s close on Wednesday. LLY YTD mountain LLY in 2023 – CNBC’s Michael Bloom contributed reporting.