Novo Nordisk's Wegovy enters India: Can this weight loss jab beat Mounjaro? Price, who can use it & how it works
Novo Nordisk has launched Wegovy, a weight loss injection, in India, challenging Eli Lilly's Mounjaro. Available by June 2025, Wegovy contains semaglutide, mimicking a hormone to control blood sugar and reduce hunger. Priced from Rs 17,345 to Rs 26,015 monthly, it showed significant weight loss in trials.
Tired of too many ads?
Remove Ads
India's obesity market is growing fast
Tired of too many ads?
Remove Ads
How Wegovy Works
Wegovy India Price List
Dose Monthly Price (Rs) Price Per Dose (Rs) 0.25 mg Rs 17,345 Rs 4,366 0.5 mg Rs 17,345 Rs 4,366 1 mg Rs 17,345 Rs 4,366 1.75 mg Rs 24,280 Rs 6,070 2.4 mg Rs 26,015 Rs 6,503
Mounjaro Dose Monthly Price (Rs) 2.5 mg Rs 14,000 5 mg Rs 17,500
Almost like weight loss surgery, but with a catch
Wegovy vs Mounjaro: What's the Difference?
Feature Wegovy (Semaglutide) Mounjaro (Tirzepatide) How it works Mimics GLP-1 hormone Acts on GLP-1 and GIP hormones Effect Lowers appetite, slows digestion Improves insulin and reduces appetite Approved for Weight loss Diabetes (off-label for weight loss) How to use Weekly injection via Flexpen Weekly injection via vial Price range Rs 17,345–Rs 26,015 Rs 14,000–Rs 17,500
In a big step for India's weight loss drug market, Danish pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk has officially launched Wegovy , its much-talked-about weight loss injection. The company is now competing directly with Eli Lilly's popular drug, Mounjaro Wegovy is a once-a-week injection that comes in a pen-like device called FlexTouch. It's easy to use and doesn't require vials or syringes. According to Managing Director of Novo Nordisk India, Vikrant Shrotriya, the drug will be available in pharmacies across India by the end of June 2025, The Times of India reported.India has one of the world's highest numbers of people struggling with weight. Around 254 million people have general obesity and over 351 million suffer from belly fat-related issues. With the anti-obesity medicine market jumping from Rs 133 crore in 2021 to Rs 576 crore today (as per PharmaTrac), Novo Nordisk sees a huge opportunity.Shrotriya said, 'Obesity is a chronic illness and a growing problem in India. Wegovy is easy to use and will be priced specially for Indian patients.'Wegovy contains a compound called semaglutide , which mimics a natural hormone in the body. This hormone helps control blood sugar, reduce hunger, slow digestion, and make you feel full for longer. While similar drugs like Ozempic are meant for diabetes, Wegovy is approved for long-term weight loss.It comes in a FlexTouch device, allowing users to adjust their weekly dose easily. Each monthly pack includes four needles. The medicine works on brain areas that manage appetite and food cravings.According to Dr V. Mohan, a well-known diabetologist, 'Semaglutide not only helps in weight loss but also improves heart and inflammation markers. It's a strong option for Indian patients dealing with both obesity and rising heart risks.'For comparison, Eli Lilly's Mounjaro is slightly cheaper:Wegovy has shown very strong results. In global studies, people lost up to 15% of their weight on average, and some even lost 20%. It also helped lower the risk of heart attacks and strokes and improved liver health.However, the results are mostly maintained only if the person continues using the drug. If stopped, weight gain can return. Doctors also warn that muscle loss may happen over time, so people need to be regularly monitored.Inputs from TOI
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Economic Times
25 minutes ago
- Economic Times
New data show most US patients now stay on Wegovy, Zepbound after a year
IANS Representational Image Nearly two-thirds of patients who started on weight-loss drugs Wegovy or Zepbound last year were still taking them a year later, according to an analysis of U.S. pharmacy claims. That level of persistence is higher than what prior analyses have shown, suggesting that more patients might be staying on the popular GLP-1 drugs for obesity as product shortages ease, insurance coverage expands and doctors manage side effects better, health experts say. Sixty-three percent of patients starting on Novo Nordisk's Wegovy or Eli Lilly's Zepbound during the first quarter of 2024 were still taking them 12 months later. For Wegovy, that was up significantly from 40% who started therapy in 2023 and 34% who began three years ago in this analysis by Prime Therapeutics, a pharmacy benefits manager (PBM). Patrick Gleason, Prime's assistant vice president for health outcomes and a co-author of the analysis, said he was surprised to see persistence rise above 50%. "It's a near doubling from one-third persistent to roughly two-thirds now," Gleason said. "This is a dramatic change, and I believe this is more reflective of what we will see going forward." Zepbound's results were relatively unchanged year over year, though the number of U.S. patients starting on the medication in 2023 was limited since it did not launch until November of that year. Wegovy was approved in June 2021. The analysis shared with Reuters does not include details about why patients continued or stopped therapy. Some people have reported stopping because the drugs became unaffordable or their insurance no longer covered them. Others quit due to common gastrointestinal side effects, inability to get refills due to supply shortages or achievement of their weight-loss goal, among other factors. Studies have shown that most patients who quit their GLP-1 drugs usually regain most of the weight. The medications may require extended use to yield meaningful benefits for patients' health. Many employers and government agencies remain wary of adding coverage for these highly effective, but expensive medicines due to the significant upfront investment and uncertainty about any future savings. Dr. Ezekiel J. Emanuel, co-director of the Healthcare Transformation Institute at the University of Pennsylvania, said low persistence on these weight-loss drugs had been concerning and the new data might indicate that increased insurance coverage is helping to turn the tide. Novo declined to comment on the data, and Lilly did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Prime is owned by 19 U.S. Blue Cross and Blue Shield health insurance plans and manages pharmacy benefits for about 73 million people. In its analysis, Prime reviewed pharmacy and medical claims for 23,025 people with commercial health plans who received prescriptions for either Wegovy or Zepbound and had a diagnosis of obesity. Prime excluded patients with a diabetes diagnosis in their medical claims or who were using a drug for type 2 diabetes, for which these GLP-1 medicines were originally developed. The mean age of patients in the year-over-year analysis was 46 and 77% were female. Patients were deemed persistent with their medication if they had no 60-day gaps in supply. The data allowed for switching among GLP-1 products. The data does not include patients who took compounded versions of the weight-loss drugs or paid for their prescription out of pocket outside of insurance. Prime also did a separate analysis of longer-term use. Only 14% of patients were still taking Wegovy after three years, the data show. That was a drop from 24% on Wegovy at the two-year mark. That longer-term analysis examined 5,780 patients who had remained enrolled in their health insurance for three years and did not have type 2 diabetes. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration removed semaglutide, the active ingredient in Wegovy, from its shortage list earlier this year and did the same for tirzepatide, the active ingredient in Zepbound, in December. Those moves eventually barred compounding pharmacies from making cheaper copies of the weight-loss drugs. Some patients have purchased these weight-loss medications directly from the drugmakers outside of their health insurance. Those prescriptions were not tracked in this analysis and that cohort of patients may behave differently, said David Lassen, Prime's vice president of clinical pharmacy services. "That group could have a different adherence pattern," Lassen said. "That's something we want to continue to watch."
&w=3840&q=100)
Business Standard
38 minutes ago
- Business Standard
New data shows just how powerful the next weight-loss drugs may be
Doctors call the new weight-loss drugs revolutionary. Game-changing. Unprecedented. Soon, they may also call them obsolete. Drugmakers are racing to develop the next wave of obesity and diabetes medications that they hope will be even more powerful than those currently on the market. 'I think what we are going to see very quickly is that Wegovy has received a lot of the press attention, because it got there first,' said Simon Cork, a senior lecturer at Anglia Ruskin University in England who has studied obesity. 'But it will be rapidly overtaken by much more potent medications.' On Saturday, researchers presented data at an annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association on perhaps the most anticipated of these medications: a daily pill. A late-stage study showed that the drug, called orforglipron, appeared to be about as effective as a weekly Ozempic injection at inducing weight loss and lowering blood sugar. It is just one of over a dozen experimental medications that researchers will share data about at the conference this weekend. Some of these drugs are still in early trials, but others could hit the market as soon as next year. They include medications that may lead to more weight loss than the roughly 15 to 20 percent body weight people lose on existing drugs. They may also be easier to take than weekly injections and help people shed pounds without dropping as much muscle. More competition — and, in the case of the pill, lower manufacturing costs — might also mean that, eventually, patients pay less. 'A lot of people are like, 'Oh, we have Ozempic, everything's good now,'' said Megan Capozzi, a research assistant professor at the University of Washington Medicine who studies treatments for diabetes and obesity. 'But I think there are so many more things to improve on.' More convenience, less muscle loss By some estimates, one in eight adults in the United States has already taken a medication like Wegovy or Zepbound. But researchers believe far more people would use — and stick with — weight-loss drugs that did not require weekly injections. Simply put, Dr. Capozzi said, 'people would rather takes pills than shots.' That's why doctors and investors are so excited about orforglipron. Like Ozempic and other drugs on the market, orforglipron mimics a hormone that regulates blood sugar and curbs appetite. In the data presented at the conference, researchers who followed over 500 patients with Type 2 diabetes reported that those who took the highest dose lost an average of around 16 pounds after nine months. Around two-thirds of people who took the drug also saw their blood sugar levels fall to a target range. If the drug is more broadly used in people with obesity and not just diabetes, those with higher body weights may see even more weight loss, since people with diabetes alone tend to lose less on these kinds of drugs, said Dr. Scott Hagan, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Washington. Eli Lilly, the pharmaceutical company that makes the pill, will release data from additional studies in orforglipron in people with obesity later this year. The company will seek regulatory approval for the drug first as an obesity treatment and later for Type 2 diabetes. It could be available as soon as next year. The company has not said how much orforglipron will cost, but it's generally cheaper to mass-produce pills than shots. If it does have a significantly lower price tag than the currently available drugs, which can cost hundreds or even around a thousand dollars a month, more patients could afford the medication. More insurers might even cover it. Over the next few days, researchers will also present data on other, earlier-stage drugs that could be more convenient than weekly shots. This includes MariTide, an injectable drug made by the biopharmaceutical company Amgen that patients could take once a month. Some new medications in development are also trying to solve for a persistent side effect of existing drugs: Patients who lose fat also tend to lose muscle. This can be particularly dangerous for older adults because it makes them more likely to fall and can worsen osteoporosis. One experimental drug combines the substance in Ozempic and a compound that blocks the receptors that regulate skeletal muscle and fat mass. Several others simulate the hormone amylin, which has been shown in rodent studies to preserve some lean muscle tissue, though more data is needed in humans. Some researchers remain skeptical that any drug can lead to significant weight loss without sacrificing at least some muscle. Potential for even more weight loss While the incoming generation of drugs might offer more convenience or help safeguard muscle, it's still unclear whether they would offer significantly greater weight loss. Investors and doctors had high hopes for a drug called CagriSema, which is a weekly injection that combines the substance in Ozempic with a new compound. Novo Nordisk, the company that makes the drug, had set a goal of 25 percent weight loss, but the early results fell short, showing that people with obesity who took the drug lost nearly 23 percent of their body weight after over a year. That was not enough for analysts to consider the drug a clear winner over Zepbound, which is widely considered the most effective option on the market. 'The threshold for a slam dunk is now getting just higher and higher,' Dr. Hagan said. But some drugs that are less far along in development look more promising, including retatrutide, a weekly injection that beat the Zepbound results in early trials. That medication is still long away from potential approval, however. Even if some medications that hit the market soon deliver only equivalent weight loss, or nearly as much, their arrival could have a big impact, for a few reasons. The biggest of these is that a cheaper or more convenient medication could help more patients stay on a weight-loss drug for longer. People are supposed to stay on weight-loss drugs for the rest of their lives — if patients stop taking a drug, they often regain weight. But by some estimates, over half of patients go off these drugs within a year, sometimes because of insurance issues, side effects or intermittent shortages of the medications. These interruptions help explain why people lose much less weight in the real world than they do in carefully controlled clinical trials. 'We're going to turn around in three to five years and find out that the vast majority of people were only on these drugs for eight or nine months, gone off these drugs and gained back the weight,' said Dr. David Kessler, a former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration who has written a book about weight-loss drugs. 'We're going to conclude that this has been one big failure — unless we can figure out how to use these drugs in the real world,' he added. Many of the medications in development also work slightly differently from those currently on the market. This might mean that individual people will respond better to them, Dr. Hagan said. By some estimates, around 15 percent of people do not lose substantial weight on the drugs available now. The more options there are, the better doctors can make sure patients are getting the drug best suited for them, Dr. Hagan said. 'We're starting to shift out of the initial phase where, 'Oh, wow, we finally have some drugs that are safe and effective,'' he said. 'We have a menu of them.'
Mint
an hour ago
- Mint
The weight loss drug market has gotten messy. What to know.
Compounded weight loss drugs have been mostly off the market for about a month, but the weight loss drug industry remains as unsettled as ever. Earlier this week, Novo Nordisk tore up a partnership with the telehealth storefront Hims & Hers Health, which had allowed Hims to sell the Novo weight loss drug Wegovy at a lower price for cash-paying patients. The spat between the two companies, which sent Hims shares down more than 30% on Monday, is just the latest disruption for patients looking to lose weight using GLP-1 drugs sold by Novo and its rival, Eli Lilly. The massive growth last year of the market for legal knockoff weight loss drugs caused huge complications for Novo and Lilly, which had seen big gains in market value amid the waves of hype that had greeted the launch of their respective obesity blockbusters, Wegovy and Zepbound. By early 2025, both stocks had pulled back amid a broader reconsideration of the weight loss opportunity. Today, the legal knockoffs are mostly gone, but the market for the weight loss drugs is as unsettled as ever. Here's what to know about the weight loss drug market now, and where it's going. Why can't you buy compounded semaglutide anymore? When a branded drug is in shortage in the U.S., compounding pharmacies are allowed to make and sell knockoff versions. That's not usually a major issue for pharmaceutical companies, but the prolonged shortages of Zepbound and Wegovy—combined with massive demand— created an opportunity that the ascendant telehealth industry seized. Companies like Hims & Hers, Ro, Noom, and other smaller competitors leapt into the compounded semaglutide market last year, selling the legal knockoff drugs at prices generally starting around $200 for the first month of treatment, and $300 per month as dosage levels increase. That was a steep discount to Wegovy's list price of $1,350 per month, and consumers leapt at the opportunity to get a cheaper version of a GLP-1 weight loss drug. Novo says it thinks that more than a million people were taking compounded GLP-1 drugs by early 2025. When the Food and Drug Administration determined that the shortages of Zepbound and Wegovy were over, it set deadlines for compounding pharmacies to stop making semaglutide in bulk. That deadline expired on May 22. Since then, the compounding pharmacies that supply the telehealth firms haven't been allowed to make compounded semaglutide to sell on a commercial scale. What choices do patients have? For patients whose insurance covers Zepbound or Wegovy, nothing has changed. But for the patients without coverage who lost access to compounded semaglutide as of late May, Lilly and Novo offered an alternative: Cash-pay options for Wegovy and Zepbound that are cheaper than the list price, but more expensive than the compounded versions. Novo's direct-to-consumer offering comes in an injector pen just like the version that patients get through normal pharmacy channels, while Lilly's direct-to-consumer Zepbound comes in a vial patients need to draw and inject themselves. Through its in-house online pharmacy, Novo sells Wegovy to patients without insurance coverage for $499 per month. (It's currently running a special offer for a month of Wegovy for $199.) Lilly, through its own online pharmacy, sells Zepbound for $499 per month for most dosage levels, and $349 per month for the starter dose. Both Novo and Lilly have set up partnerships that allow some of the telehealth firms that sold compounded GLP-1s to offer the cheaper direct-to-consumer version of their branded weight loss shots. Novo announced arrangements with Hims, LifeMD, and Ro in April, while Teladoc Health and LifeMD have access to Lilly's pharmacy. The partnership between Hims and Novo blew up early this week, sending Hims shares down sharply. Why are some telehealth pharmacies still selling compounded semaglutide? It's still easy to find online pharmacies advertising compounded semaglutide. Hims, for one, is advertising 'personalized compounded GLP-1" injections for $165 per month for patients who pay for a full year up front. While the compounding pharmacies can't compound semaglutide in bulk anymore, U.S. law and FDA rules do seem to allow them create a prescription for an individual patient, under certain circumstances. The compounding semaglutide still legally available is likely being sold as a personalized prescription that's tweaked in some way such that it's different, perhaps in dosage size, from commercially available Wegovy. Novo's contention on Monday was that Hims was using the 'false guise" of personalization to keep selling compounding semaglutide. The Hims CEO, in a social media post, said Novo had been pushing the company to 'steer patients to Wegovy." Is all this confusion good for the drugmakers? Probably not. What is increasingly clear, though, is that Lilly is looking to be the long-term winner. In a note on prescription data published June 20, Cantor analyst Carter Gould wrote that based on reports thus far, Zepbound sales will likely be up 24% from the first quarter of the year to the second quarter, while Wegovy sales will be up 5% to 6%. Write to Josh Nathan-Kazis at
