Eli Lilly’s weight loss pill has received approval in the US, increasing pressure on Novo Nordisk, which launched an obesity pill earlier this year.
Lilly’s pill is approved to help people lose weight or maintain previous weight loss. The review process took less than four months thanks to a new U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) program designed to accelerate access to promising medicines that address national priorities, offer innovative treatments or address unmet medical needs.
Lilly’s pill, called Foundayo, will be administered once a day, the FDA said in a statement. Foundayo’s smallest doses will cost $149 per month for patients who pay in cash.
Lilly shares rose as much as 4.5% in New York trading. Novo’s share receipts (ADRs) fell by up to 1.9%. Novo’s ADRs fell by up to 2.6%.
Lilly is moving to catch up to Novo, whose weight-loss pill has been in high demand since it was approved in December. The company has already produced billions of doses of Foundayo to ensure a quick rollout. Sales could reach US$18 billion by 2030, according to Wall Street analysts interviewed by Bloomberg.
Novo’s pill, which uses the same ingredient as its most successful injections, Ozempic and Wegovy, has been a key piece in the company’s recovery strategy amid increased competition. The pharmaceutical company was the first to reach the US market, but has been rapidly losing share to Lilly’s more potent injections in recent years.
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Now the fight is shifting to pills, which are cheaper to produce, can be easier to take and are expected to help push the market past $100 billion by 2030. More than 600,000 prescriptions have been written for Novo’s weight-loss pill, making it one of the most successful drug launches in history.
In clinical studies, Novo’s 25-milligram pill led people to lose about 13.6% of their body weight in 64 weeks, on average, using a metric that includes those who stopped treatment. The company claims these results give it an advantage over Lilly’s pill, which led to slightly less weight loss in separate studies.
Still, doctors say the 11 percent weight loss seen in patients in the Lilly study is more than enough to be significant. Side effects in the trials were mainly gastrointestinal and similar to those from injections.
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Although Novo’s pill appears to be slightly more effective than Lilly’s, it comes with more dosage restrictions. Patients should take it in the morning with a sip of water on an empty stomach and wait 30 minutes before eating or drinking. Lilly’s pill does not have these same limitations.
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