Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said Monday that his administration now covers GLP-1 weight-loss drugs for roughly 55,000 state employees — and revealed in the same interview that he has personally lost 80 pounds using the medication.
Pritzker made the disclosure to CBS News in an interview that aired Monday, pitching the state-funded coverage as a long-term money-saver because fewer residents will develop diabetes. He said he intends to use his office to promote the drug, according to an account of the interview published by Breitbart News.
“I have an opportunity, just with the platform I have as governor, to tell people that this is something that can work for them,” Pritzker said. “I think they should do it with a doctor’s advice. But I can tell you, at least for me, it has been really life-changing.”
A costly expansion
The coverage expansion, which his administration approved in July 2024, opened the program beyond diabetes patients to include weight loss. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, the change cost Illinois $147 million in fiscal year 2025. Pritzker’s office had initially projected $210 million for the first full year of the program, and some economists warned the figure could run three times higher, with individual prescriptions costing more than $16,000 annually.
The governor has not previously discussed his own use of the medication. NBC Chicago reported that he had dodged questions about his weight loss for the past year before Monday’s disclosure.
Pritzker described a weekly injection regimen, morning walks of nearly four miles along Lake Michigan, and the end of his need for insulin. He said the medication quieted his appetite within days.
“All of a sudden, on the third day, I was like, you know, actually, I don’t need to eat that thing,” Pritzker said, describing the end of his food cravings.
Family history and personal stakes
The governor tied his decision to his family’s medical history. His father, Donald, suffered a fatal heart attack at 39 while on a tennis court, and Pritzker said he has struggled with his weight since he was seven or eight years old.
Pritzker is seeking a third term this fall and has been widely floated as a possible Democratic presidential contender in 2028. Asked whether a White House run factored into his decision to lose weight, he declined to say, pointing instead to his reelection campaign.
“I honestly am focused on what’s best for the people of Illinois,” Pritzker said when asked directly about 2028.
The disclosure lands in the middle of a broader national debate over whether state and federal health programs should pay for GLP-1 medications, which have surged in popularity for weight loss but carry steep price tags. Pritzker’s argument — that covering the drugs now avoids the higher costs of treating diabetes later — mirrors the case other Democratic governors and some insurers have made as they weigh adding the treatments to public plans.
Critics of broad public coverage have pointed to the same cost estimates Pritzker’s own office once issued, arguing that the projections have a history of climbing rather than falling. The Sun-Times reporting on the $147 million figure suggests the first year came in below the administration’s initial $210 million estimate, though economists’ higher-end projections remain a live concern for budget watchers.
During the 2024 presidential campaign, President Donald Trump said Pritzker “wants to eat all the time” — a remark the governor did not address in Monday’s interview but one that resurfaced quickly after the weight-loss disclosure.
Pritzker’s use of the drug also puts him in a growing group of public officials who have spoken openly about GLP-1 treatments, a category that has moved from celebrity testimonials into statehouse policy fights over who pays. For Illinois, the practical question is whether the $147 million outlay in fiscal 2025 becomes a recurring line item or a one-time jump before costs stabilize — something the governor’s office has not detailed publicly beyond the first-year figures.
The medication itself remains the subject of ongoing research into long-term benefits and side effects, and Pritzker’s remarks emphasized a doctor-guided approach rather than a blanket recommendation. His message, as he framed it, was personal experience offered as encouragement — not medical advice.
For a governor in the middle of a reelection bid and mentioned in early 2028 speculation, the disclosure carries political weight on multiple fronts: it aligns him with a popular treatment at a moment when voters are weighing health care costs, and it invites scrutiny of a program whose price tag already drew attention from fiscal analysts.
Pritzker did not say whether he would expand the coverage further or adjust it in a second term, and his office has not signaled changes to the program’s structure. For now, the state’s 55,000 covered employees remain the most concrete figure attached to a policy argument the governor is now making partly from personal experience.
Source: www.breitbart.com — https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2026/09/21/jb-pritzker-glp1-80-pounds-illinois-state-workers/