Welcome to the Injection Age

My generation—which is to say, the pillbox generation—came of age during the 1990s. The number of adults who were taking five or more prescription drugs doubled in that decade; the use of medications for depression and cholesterol more than tripled. If pills had once been used from time to time to curb a headache or stifle an infection, now they were a daily ritual for tens of millions of Americans. Popping meds, whether by catapult or tweezers, became the norm.In the 2020s, we’re living through a second such transition: the dawning of the needle age.For the past five years, the nation’s shots have multiplied to levels never seen before. Injected medications were once unusual, and mostly limited to diabetics who needed insulin. Now millions of diabetics use syringes of Ozempic, and millions of other people are on Mounjaro for weight loss. In 2025, some 12 percent of all U.S. adults partook of these injections or others in their class. GLP-1 shots were so commonplace last year that they accounted for about 7 percent of all prescriptions in America.Even this is just the tip of the needle. Americans’ use of IVF has doubled in a decade, and now requires something on the order of 10 million to 20 million self-administered hormone shots a year. By 2024, 10 million rounds of Botox (or other wrinkle relaxants) were given out, along with 8 million filler treatments. Although some cosmetic shots are administered in doctors’ offices, many of the rest are received at the 10,000 “medical spas” that have lately come to dot the country. These are puncture parlors, more or less, and they offer a growing list of services: not just treatments for the skin but also vitamin injections, IV-dripped electrolytes, and minerals delivered through a tube. One needle-forward wellness chain, called JECT, has locations in Miami Beach, West Hollywood, the Hamptons, and, as it happens, right around the corner from my house in Brooklyn. If I were ever in the mood, I could head over for a “24K gold