Finasteride Popularity Fuels Obsession With Male Hairlines

Finasteride isn't just holding hairlines in place—the drug called "Ozempic for baldness" in a New York Times Magazine headline seems to be changing men's attitudes about their looks and masculinity. In a deep dive for the magazine, Susan Dominus traces how the once-niche drug—best known under the old brand name Propecia—has gone mainstream among 20- and 30-somethings who now treat baldness as a preventable condition, not a rite of passage. Prescriptions for finasteride have surged since telehealth made it cheap and discreet, while social media, influencers, and targeted ads push young men toward "prejuvenation," the idea of medicating early so the receding hairline never appears.

Dominus lays out the trade-off: studies show finasteride is highly effective at slowing loss and restoring some hair, but a minority of users report sexual and psychological side effects, occasionally long-lasting and life-altering. (The Wall Street Journal took an earlier look at reported problems.) That risk fuels intense online battles—especially on Reddit—between men who say the pill changed their lives for the better and others who warn of "post-finasteride syndrome." Underneath it all is a larger shift: men absorbing the kind of appearance anxiety long associated with women. "There's kind of a poetic justice to it," says one man quoted in the Times story. Read it in full here.