For a century society has bullied and shamed people into trying to lose weight, without much result.

Now, a seemingly accidental discovery by Danish pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk may be the first weight loss drug that actually works.

People are hailing semaglutide, marketed under the names Ozempic or Wegovy, as a miracle weight loss drug — but it comes at a cost.

One clear winner is the Danish economy, as semaglutide has shot Novo Nordisk into the stratosphere as the most valuable company in all of Europe.

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China's economy is struggling. Similar things are happening across Asia but in China it's happening extremely fast.

And a big part of the reason why is the disastrous One Child Policy and years of dodgy population data.

How can you make plans for a country when you don't know how many people you have?

Now the population is going backward, the property sector is faltering, and China is in a world of trouble.

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Find more If You're Listening on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4E5qY_tTDg&t

While everyone has their eyes on the war in Ukraine, West Africa is threatening to break out into war.

There's been a seemingly unstoppable wave of coups washing along the edge of the Sahara, gaining strength each time.

After the recent military coup in Niger, locals were seen chanting "down with France" and "long live Putin".

What are France and Russia doing in West Africa? And could they end up in a proxy war?

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Microchips are in your car, your microwave — there might even be one in your kettle. They run everything.

And the best microchips are made by TSMC, the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company.

TSMC chips have put Western tech companies and militaries streets ahead of China, and China is not happy about it.

TSMC is so important, that the world could go to war over it.

Find more If You're Listening on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tC3u8NEqU8&t

Inflation in Argentina is at 100 per cent. The government is printing money fast and locals are spending in US dollars because the peso is so unreliable. The economy is like a rollercoaster.

It might be tempting to think, "they're different over there", but here's the thing: they're kind of not. Argentina — one of the wealthiest countries in the world — was once uncomfortably similar to Australia. Until it totally lost control of its own economy.

Donald Trump has been charged with trying and failing to delete CCTV evidence of farcical, and allegedly criminal behaviour.

It's just the latest charge in the case against the former president over his… interesting decision to take classified documents with him when he left the White House.

Could it land him in jail? We tell the story of how Trump got into this predicament, and his plan to get out of it.

A bromance is a powerful thing. Lennon and McCartney. Holmes and Watson. Gilbert and Sullivan. Han and Chewy. But occasionally a bromance can nearly get you killed.

A month ago the entire world watched transfixed as a former chef named Yevgeny Prigozhin marched with his private army on Moscow. At the core of this mutiny is a bromance between Prigozhin and a guy you've probably never heard of — General Sergei Surovikin.

Prigozhin assumed his friend Surovikin would back him up, but he flaked, and now both men are missing. So how did Prigozhin's bromance with Surovikin nearly bring down the Russian Government? And what's the punishment for even thinking about trying to roll Vladimir Putin?

We now make a video version of If You're Listening! Check us out on YouTube and iView.

If You're Listening is back, and better than ever. Same espionage, same corruptions, same scandals, but more often.

Not only will we be in your feed every Thursday, we'll also cover a different story each week. And if you prefer to watch rather than listen, we're also making videos for iView and YouTube.

Episode one drops Thursday, 27th July.

After ten months of war, a few likely outcomes of the war in Ukraine are emerging.

A win for Vladimir Putin. A win for Volodymyr Zelenskyy. A bitter frozen conflict. 

Neither Putin or Zelenskyy will sign a peace agreement and admit defeat. 

But what if Putin’s regime ends?

Guests:

• Dr Paul Dibb - Emeritus Professor of Strategic Studies at ANU; Former Director of the Australian Joint Intelligence Organisation
• Lieutenant General (retired) Ben Hodges - former commanding general of the US Army in Europe
• Dr Mykhailo Minakov - Philosopher; Editor in Chief of Focus Ukraine blog from the Kennan Institute at the Wilson Center
• Michael Bociurkiw - Global Affairs Analyst and former spokesperson for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
• Philip Short - Former BBC Moscow Correspondent; Author of Putin: His Life and Times
• Professor Daniel Treisman, University of California, Los Angeles, co-author “Spin Dictators: The Changing Face of Tyranny in the 21st Century”

Protest is not allowed inside Russia.

There was little resistance from the Russian people to the invasion of Ukraine, and those who didn’t like it simply left. 

But Vladimir Putin has made a decree that has caused discord across Russia. Has he finally pushed his people too far?

Guests:

• Zoya Sheftalovich - Contributing editor for POLITICO
• Dr Christina Ezrahi - Historian; author of Swans of the Kremlin and Dancing for Stalin
• Denis Volkov - Director - Levada Centre, Moscow
• Dr Yevgenia Albats - Chief Editor of The New Times
• Dr Mykhailo Minakov - Philosopher; Editor in Chief of Focus Ukraine blog from the Kennan Institute at the Wilson Center