Now more than ever, it’s important to celebrate and uplift the people, places, and organizations that make our community strong. Nominations are officially open for the 2025 Best of LGBTQ DC Awards!

Nominate your favorites in each category through September 7th. The top 5 nominees will move forward as finalists, with voting beginning on September 15th.

We’ll honor the winners at the Best of LGBTQ DC Awards Party on Thursday, October 16th, and showcase them in our special issue released Friday, October 17th.

Let’s shine a spotlight on the resilience, creativity, and spirit of our community during these times. Your voice matters—help us recognize those who continue to make a difference every day.

CLICK HERE TO NOMINATE OR USE THE FORM BELOW!

Destination D.C., the nonprofit organization that promotes and tracks tourism and special events in the nation’s capital, announced on Aug. 26 that an estimated 1.2 million people attended WorldPride 2025 in D.C, which took place May 17-June 8.

 The organization says a study it conducted also shows WorldPride 2025 had a positive economic impact on the city of $310.7 million.

Those numbers fall far short of predictions of 2-3 million visitors and nearly $800 million in economic impact. Hotel occupancy rates were 5 percent lower than in 2024 for the same week.

The announcement of the WorldPride attendance and economic impact numbers were included in a statement reporting on the economic impact of tourism in the city in 2024, changes in visitation and tourism occurring in 2025, and Destination D.C.’s plans to promote tourism in 2026.

Some D.C. government officials, including Mayor Muriel Bowser, whose office provided D.C. agency support for WorldPride events, had predicted back in January that as many as three million visitors would turn out for WorldPride D.C. Some city officials had also predicted the WorldPride events would have as much as a $787 million economic impact on the city.

But not long after President Donald Trump took office on Jan. 20, 2025 and began putting in place policies hostile to countries in Europe, Latin America, and Canada, including proposed tariffs, news began to surface that many potential visitors from foreign countries, including possible LGBTQ visitors, were choosing not to come to the United States.

Trump’s statements and policies in opposition to LGBTQ people, especially transgender people, also played a role in alienating potential visitors to the U.S. for WorldPride, observers have said. 

“Washington, D.C. shined during WorldPride, an incredible celebration that honored and advocated for the global LGBTQ+ community, with an estimated 1.2 million attendees across hundreds of events, resulting in $310.7 million in economic impact,” the Destination D.C. statement says.

“While the impact was significant, hotel occupancy throughout the duration of WorldPride was down about five percent year-over-year, according to STR,” the statement continues. STR is a tourism research firm.

 “An economic impact study conducted in early 2024 predicted stronger figures based on travel trends from 2023, before the current political and economic climate,” it says.

“Despite those challenges, WorldPride had strong regional support and went far in extending the message that Washington, D.C. is a welcoming and inclusive destination for visitors of all backgrounds,” according to the statement. “There were attendees from all over the world.”

Capital Pride Alliance, the D.C.-based group that played the lead role in organizing WorldPride D.C. 2025, had pointed out that the local D.C. government hosting WorldPride has a longtime strong record of support for the LGBTQ community.

The group argued that LGBTQ activists should turn out for WorldPride as a form of protest against the Trump administration, among other things, by joining the planned WorldPride LGBTQ and allied March on Washington for Freedom that took place June 8 and traveled from the Lincoln Memorial to the U.S. Capitol.

Capital Pride Alliance Executive Director Ryan Bos said that while the 1.2 million attendance number released by Destination D.C. is lower than what had initially been predicted, it is double the number of people who turn out for the city’s annual Capital Pride events.

“We’re thrilled about the number of folks that made it to Washington to experience WorldPride at a time when our community was under attack,” Bos told the Washington Blade. “And this report shows that this event, as our Capital Pride shows every year, is a strong economic engine for the District of Columbia,” he said.

“It was a challenging time,” Bos said. “But it was a historic WorldPride. We’re thrilled that we were able to bring the community together internationally, nationally, and locally.”

He said D.C. WorldPride included more than 300 events.

Dana Piccoli tried everything to lose weight. 

She frequented the gym, went on and off diets and hired a personal trainer. When Piccoli decided to get on a GLP-1, it wasn’t a “short cut” to drop weight – it was a way for her to live her life comfortably.

“When I told someone I was on it, they were like, ‘I’m going to the gym because I want to do it the right way,’” said Piccoli, managing director of queer media collaborative News is Out. “Obviously that kind of stung because for me, this is the right way.”

GLP-1 drugs have caused quite a stir since becoming more integrated into mainstream medicine. The newness of some brands, like Ozempic, have led to stigmas and mistrust surrounding them. These stigmas disproportionately affect the LGBTQ+ community since queer people are more subject to body dissatisfaction and have more trouble finding accessible healthcare.

Through all the noise, however, experts say taking GLP-1s are safe with the right counseling, and LGBTQ+ people could largely benefit from them.

So, what’s all the ruckus about? Are GLP-1s an “easy way out” to lose weight? And how do they really impact the LGBTQ+ community?

How GLP-1s work

GLP-1s, or glucagon-like peptide-1, mimic the actions of a GLP-1 that is released by the gut after eating. It can help people with Type-2 diabetes by lowering blood sugar through the release of insulin, and can help those with obesity by slowing down digestion and, in turn, reducing one’s appetite.

Like any medication, there are some side effects to consider. Sangeeta Kashyap, assistant chief of clinical affairs at Weill Cornell Medicine, said symptoms like nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting can occur. However, Kashyap said these side effects are less severe than past GLP-1 brands – a reason that contributes to their newfound popularity – and can be better managed with proper guidance. 

Since the drug causes a loss of both fat and muscle loss, she said doctors should inform patients to do strength training to maintain any deteriorating muscle, and to eat high-protein diets, since fatty foods increase the risk of vomiting or nausea.

Getting on a GLP-1 isn’t just about shedding a few pounds. Kashyap said it’s a commitment to your health and body, which is why talking with a doctor and understanding the risks are crucial.

“We give patients appropriate guidelines,” Kashyap said. “We do blood tests, we monitor things, and give a lot of counseling to these patients. I don’t think you could just give the medicine out like candy.”

Piccoli, who started her GLP-1 journey with her wife, said the medication helped turn off “food noise.”

“Your motivation for things, your reward system with food is kind of disabled,” Piccoli said. “That really helped me understand my relationship with food.”

Turning down food noise

Losing weight isn’t as easy as getting on a GLP-1 and eating less. Piccoli said turning off the food noise in her brain led to a complete lifestyle shift.

“I had to completely change everything about the way I eat, everything about the way I approach food,” she said about her experience taking Mounjaro. “This has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.”

Kashyap said the lifestyle change that comes with taking a GLP-1 is why it’s important to consult a doctor first to understand how it could affect you not just physically, but also emotionally.

Kashyap said she sees higher rates of mental health disorders in transgender women, a community that already faces more barriers in finding accessible healthcare. 

This could lead to someone getting on the drug for the wrong reasons, Kashyap said. She noted that those with eating disorders or body dysmorphia could face more severe side effects. Body dysmorphia and body image concerns are already an issue for the LGBTQ+ community, Kashyap said, so prescribing GLP-1s needs to be handled with care.

One way to ethically prescribe a GLP-1 to a patient would be to conduct a mental health screening, according to Kashyap. Mental health screenings aren’t required to get on a GLP-1, but Kashyap said they would be beneficial to patients who may be prone to negative effects by taking the drug. 

Although some people may see more severe side effects, Caroline Apovian, co-director of the Center for Weight Management and Wellness at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, said GLP-1s are a completely safe and rigorously tested drug. 

If a person faces negative side effects from taking a GLP-1, it’s more about how their body or brain is reacting to it than the drug itself being unsafe.

“Any kind of weight loss is going to affect your mood, either positively or negatively,” Apovian said.

With the queer community already facing increased barriers to healthcare, there’s another issue to consider: GLP-1s aren’t cheap.

Depending on where you get it from and whether or not insurance covers it, you could pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars for a limited supply.

Piccoli said she paid out of pocket and had to make sacrifices for her and her wife to both get on a GLP-1. 

“I didn’t renew my car lease,” Piccoli said. “We decided to go down to one car so that we had some extra income monthly to be able to pay for it.”

On the other hand, Matt, who requested to be identified only by his first name due to the sensitivity of the topic, said he was shocked at how easy it was to get the cost of his GLP-1 covered by insurance. He had been warned by his doctor about the difficulty of getting it covered, and expected an “uphill battle.”

“[My doctor] wrote out the prescription for me, and on my way home, I got a text message from the drugstore saying it was ready to go,” said Matt, who’s lost 48 pounds on Ozempic since June 2024. 

Matt said experiences like his, although not the standard, are why it’s important to talk with your doctor about getting on a GLP-1 and see for yourself rather than taking advice from social media stigmas. 

Kashyap said the drug is also becoming more accessible through websites like Lilly, which provide vials for about $300-500. While that isn’t pocket change, it’s significantly cheaper than retail pharmacies.

You may have to make sacrifices like Piccoli did, but getting access to modern GLP-1s for weight loss isn’t only for the Hollywood elites like it seemed to be a few years ago.

Through all the social stigmas and uncertainty, Kashyap and Apovian agreed that GLP-1s are a major benefit for the queer community.

Trans women have increased rates of obesity, Type-2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome, according to Kashyap. Estrogen treatments increase fat mass and insulin resistance, leading to higher obesity rates in trans women. Kashyap said GLP-1s could be helpful in mitigating those effects.

GLP-1s also reduce alcohol cravings, so Kashyap noted that anyone struggling with alcoholism may see improvements with that condition upon getting on the drug. 

Getting on a GLP-1 isn’t the walk in the park some may make you believe it is – it’s a lifestyle change and health commitment.

But it’s also a change that can provide good and healthy results if you seek the appropriate guidance from a professional.

While social stigmas in the queer community may lead to misinformation on who should use it and what it should be used for, GLP-1s are safe and can be a much-needed relief for a community facing significant healthcare obstacles.