This is bunk. An actual chemical addiction is not the same as feeling an urge to drink 8 cans of coke a day, or being unable to not buy a bag of chips at the gas station.
Your entire body and brain is a complex and messy chemical reaction.
The opening sentence of the wikipedia article on addiction currently reads: "Addiction is a neuropsychological disorder characterized by a persistent and intense urge to use a drug or engage in a behavior that produces natural reward, despite substantial harm and other negative consequences."
The page then lists "eating or food addiction" as examples, with food addiction being its own entire page.
More likely it's listed as one so insurance company pay for the drugs.
Addiction treatment gets payed, low self control not.
Half Bake- Thur good goes to rehab NSFW
These are all things that we acknowledge are possible to be addicted to to that are not substances. Not to mention that coke has caffeine which is a chemical substance just as much as anything.
You can pin addiction to anything as a personal weakness, including drugs. Why are some people able to smoke a few cigarettes or do a little bit of cocaine without ever getting addicted, when others are hooked on day one?
If there's one thing that's been fun to see as the outcome of GLP-1 drugs, it's that a lot of people seem to have a real problem seeing people better themselves the "easy way".
Addiction is basically highjacking our brain wiring that’s meant to help us expend energy chasing things that we need for survival (food, reproduction), and using it to chase other things
Sure, you don't take the substance directly. But the things you do have your body produce/release the substance.
A dopamine high is a dopamine high. Even though you didn't buy a dopamine pill from a shady dude in the parking lot.
Addiction hits the same part of the brain, no matter if it's chemical, physical, or digital. Just because our culture sees them differently doesn't make it the same underlying problem.
I think avoiding bad foods is a better solution than reaching for drugs, but if the drugs help break the cycle, it could be beneficial.
If you listen to nutrition gurus, you'll hear claims like "food X contains chemical Y and chemical Y is either itself toxic or metabolizes to something toxic, therefore you shouldn't eat X". I promise you I can find videos where somebody has found something bad about spinach and will try to convince you not to eat it. It's a bad way to reason.
Identifying individual biological pathways isn't enough to make (dietary) prescriptions. Often, the metabolites of the food aren't produced in high enough quantities to make a measurable effect (on health, or this case behavior). This kind of thing has to be studied at the level of behavior.
(When I feel charitable, I can instead wring my hands and hemm and haww about the unknown consequences of people using medication to solve their health problems. I can't outline what exactly those consequences are, but I can certainly hemm and haww.)
Compulsive overeating relies on the same behavioral/reward mechanisms, with the added bonus of food being something you do physically ingest in the process.
When I was a poor teenager I was gambling online and it is an incredible way to lose money unlike anything. With the click of a button you can throw $100 or $1000 into the void- and you often follow it up until your account is empty. Hard to do with many other substances.