Latest news with #cardiometabolic
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Lilly partners with Camurus in search of a long-lasting obesity drug
This story was originally published on BioPharma Dive. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily BioPharma Dive newsletter. Looking to defend its giant cardiometabolic health franchise, Eli Lilly is licensing a technology from Swedish biotechnology firm Camurus that promises to produce longer-acting medications. Camurus' FluidCrystal technology is designed to methodically release a therapeutic drug substance into the body over a period of days or months. After an injection, the solution interacts with bodily fluids to transform into a liquid crystalline gel. The gel holds the active ingredient and then slowly degrades, releasing medicine. The deal includes an unspecified upfront payment as part of an initial package that may be worth as much as $290 million, Camurus said Tuesday. That figure also includes payments for reaching certain development and regulatory milestones. Another $580 million could be available for meeting sales goals, along with mid-single digit royalties for successful products. Lilly and rival Novo Nordisk revolutionized diabetes and obesity treatment over the last few years with GLP-1 medicines that opened up one of the biggest markets the pharmaceutical industry has ever seen. In the first quarter alone, Lilly raked in more than $6 billion from sales of tirzepatide, sold as Mounjaro for diabetes and Zepbound for obesity. Novo brought in even more from its Ozempic and Wegovy. Now Lilly and Novo are faced with defending the market as a raft of competitors vie to offer newer and better options. Both companies have bulked up their pipelines; Lilly recently claimed success in a Phase 3 trial of a GLP-1 medicine that can be taken in pill form instead of injection. It also has a triple-acting drug in development and a number of other experimental medicines that work differently. The Camurus deal allows Lilly to apply the long-acting technology to as many as four of its drug compounds. That may help the company stave off competitors such as Metsera, which in January announced promising research for its experimental long-acting GLP-1 shot. Meanwhile, Roche recently announced a $1.65 billion deal to expand its obesity pipeline and Amgen and Viking Therapeutics are both moving into late-stage studies of potential rival treatments. Companies are also working on ways to augment the Lilly and Novo medicines. Veru is testing a drug designed to help preserve muscle when taken with Novo's Wegovy. Regeneron and others are conducting similar research. Recommended Reading Novo inks Ascendis deal to develop long-acting GLP-1, other metabolic drugs
Globe and Mail
28-05-2025
- Business
- Globe and Mail
Eli Lilly vs. AstraZeneca: Which Pharma Powerhouse is the Better Buy?
LLY and AstraZeneca AZN are leading drugmakers with significant involvement in oncology, immunology, and the cardiometabolic disease space. Both are making substantial investments in next-generation therapies such as cancer immunotherapies, treatments for respiratory conditions as well as GLP-1 drugs. With robust, research-driven pipelines and strong growth potential, they represent an intriguing comparison for investors considering large-cap pharmaceutical stocks. Though both companies have a diversified product profile, Lilly's largest segment is Cardiometabolic Health, which accounts for 72% of its total revenues. Lilly has a strong portfolio of medicines to treat diabetes and other cardiometabolic diseases. Its cardiometabolic business is its most successful business, particularly with the success of its popular GLP-1 drugs, Mounjaro for diabetes and Zepbound for obesity. On the other hand, Oncology is AstraZeneca's biggest segment, comprising around 41% of its total revenues. The company is working on strengthening its oncology product portfolio through label expansions of existing products and advancement of oncology pipeline candidates. Both Lilly and AstraZeneca are seeing strong sales and earnings growth. But which one is a better investment today? Let's take a closer look at their fundamentals, growth prospects and challenges to make an informed choice. The Case for Lilly Lilly boasts a wide range of products that serve a vast number of therapeutic areas. The company focuses primarily on cardiometabolic health, neuroscience, oncology and immunology, which are all high-growth areas with significant commercial potential. Despite being on the market for less than three years, Mounjaro and Zepbound became key top-line drivers for Lilly, with demand rising rapidly. Mounjaro and Zepbound generated combined sales of $6.15 billion in the first quarter of 2025, accounting for around 48% of the company's total revenues. Though sales of Mounjaro and Zepbound were below expectations in the second half of 2024, hurt by slower-than-expected growth and unfavorable channel dynamics, their sales picked up in the first quarter of 2025, driven by launches of the drugs in new international markets and improved supply from ramped-up production. We believe that increased uptake in outside U.S. markets and deeper penetration in the U.S. market will continue to drive Mounjaro and Zepbound's growth in future quarters. Approvals for new indications can also drive sales of Mounjaro and Zepbound higher. Other than Mounjaro and Zepbound, Lilly has gained approvals for some other new drugs in the past couple of years across different therapeutic areas like Omvoh, Jaypirca, Ebglyss and Kisunla (donanemab). Lilly expects its new drugs, Mounjaro, Zepbound, Omvoh, Jaypirca, Ebglyss and Kisunla, along with the expanded use of existing drugs, to drive sales growth in 2025. Lilly is also making rapid pipeline progress in obesity, diabetes and cancer, with several key mid and late-stage data-readouts expected this year. Lilly is investing broadly in obesity and has several new molecules currently in clinical development. In terms of capital allocation, LLY returned $2.5 billion to shareholders in the first quarter via share repurchases and dividends. The board of directors of Lilly approved a new $15 billion stock buyback plan and also announced a 15% increase in its quarterly dividend in 2024. Lilly has its share of problems. Sales of its key medicine, Trulicity, are declining in the United States due to competitive dynamics, including Mounjaro switches and supply constraints. Prices of most of Lilly's products are declining in the United States. Potential competition in the GLP-1 diabetes/obesity market is another headwind. The stock also took a hit this month because CVS Caremark, a major pharmacy benefit manager ('PBM'), announced a partnership with rival Novo Nordisk NVO to make NVO's Wegovy its preferred GLP-1 therapy for weight loss, effective July 1. NVO also recently announced partnerships with telehealth providers Hims & Hers Health to offer Wegovy at a discounted price to cash-paying patients. Though Lilly's CEO, Dave Ricks does not expect CVS' decision to exclude Zepbound in favor of Wegovy to hurt Lilly's revenues, we believe it may hurt Zepbound's market share. The Case for AstraZeneca Headquartered in Cambridge, the United Kingdom, AstraZeneca boasts a diversified geographical footprint as well as a product portfolio with several blockbuster medicines. AstraZeneca now has 16 blockbuster medicines in its portfolio with sales exceeding $1 billion, including Tagrisso, Fasenra, Farxiga, Imfinzi, Lynparza, Calquence and Ultomiris. These drugs are driving the company's top line, backed by increasing demand trends. The company is confident that the growth will continue in 2025. Almost every new product it has launched in recent years has done well. Newer drugs like Wainua, Airsupra, Saphnelo, Datroway (partnered with Daiichi Sankyo) and Truqap are also expected to continue to contribute to top-line growth in 2025. Backed by its new products and pipeline drugs, AstraZeneca believes it can post industry-leading top-line growth in the 2025-2030 period. AstraZeneca expects to generate $80 billion in total revenues by 2030, a significant increase from the $54 billion it generated in 2024. By the said time frame, AstraZeneca plans to launch 20 new medicines, with nine new medicines already launched/approved. It believes that many of these new medicines will have the potential to generate more than $5 billion in peak-year revenues. The company is also on track to achieve a mid-30s percentage core operating margin by 2026. AstraZeneca faces its share of challenges. The impact of Part D redesign hurt sales of AZN's older drugs, Tagrisso, Lynparza and Ultomiris, as well as newer drugs, Truqap and Wainua, in the United States in the first quarter of 2025, with the trend expected to continue through the rest of the year. AstraZeneca expects Farxiga and Lynparza to be included in the volume-based procurement plans in China in mid-2025, which can hurt sales of these drugs in the country. Pricing and competitive pressure in Europe and generic competition in some emerging markets are expected to hurt drug sales. In 2025, generic/biosimilar competition in the United States is expected to hurt sales of key drugs like Brilinta and Soliris. Sales in its Rare Disease segment are expected to be slower in 2025 than in 2024. As regards shareholders' returns, AstraZeneca intends to increase its annual dividend per share to $3.20 per share in 2025. How Do Estimates Compare for LLY & AZN? The Zacks Consensus Estimate for LLY's 2025 sales and EPS implies a year-over-year increase of 32.6% and 70.0%, respectively. EPS estimates for 2025 as well as 2026 have declined over the past 60 days. LLY Estimate Movement The Zacks Consensus Estimate for AstraZeneca's 2025 sales and EPS implies a year-over-year increase of 6.7% and 9.3%, respectively. EPS estimates for both 2025 and 2026 have risen over the past 60 days. AZN Estimate Movement Price Performance and Valuation of AZN & LLY Year to date, while LLY's stock has declined 5.7%, AstraZeneca's stock has risen 9.8%. The industry has declined 4.5% in the said time frame. Image Source: Zacks Investment Research Both Lilly and AZN are priced higher than the industry from a valuation standpoint. Lilly is more expensive than AstraZeneca, going by the price/earnings ratio. Lilly's shares currently trade at 28.31 forward earnings, higher than 15.13 for AZN. However, both AZN and LLY are trading at discounts to their 5-year mean. Image Source: Zacks Investment Research Lilly's dividend yield is 0.8%, while AZN's is much higher at around 2.9%. Lilly's return on equity of 85.5% is higher than AZN's 33.1%. LLY or AZN: Which is a Better Pick? Both Lilly and AstraZeneca have a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), which makes choosing one stock a difficult task. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here. Lilly is a good stock to have in one's portfolio, considering its diversified product and pipeline portfolio and robust growth prospects despite its expensive valuation. Lilly's tremendous success with Mounjaro and Zepbound has made it the largest drugmaker with a market cap of more than $650 billion. In 2025, Lilly expects to record revenues in the range of $58.0 billion to $61.0 billion, indicating an impressive 32% year-over-year growth. However, considering Lilly's several near-term challenges, AstraZeneca looks like a safer bet for short-term investors, given its price appreciation, cheaper valuation and robust growth prospects. Despite the potential impact from Part D redesign, AstraZeneca expects total revenues to grow by a high single-digit percentage at CER in 2025. AstraZeneca expects core EPS to increase by a low double-digit percentage. Consistently rising estimates also indicate analysts' optimistic outlook for growth. Only $1 to See All Zacks' Buys and Sells We're not kidding. Several years ago, we shocked our members by offering them 30-day access to all our picks for the total sum of only $1. No obligation to spend another cent. Thousands have taken advantage of this opportunity. Thousands did not - they thought there must be a catch. Yes, we do have a reason. We want you to get acquainted with our portfolio services like Surprise Trader, Stocks Under $10, Technology Innovators, and more, that closed 256 positions with double- and triple-digit gains in 2024 alone. See Stocks Now >> AstraZeneca PLC (AZN): Free Stock Analysis Report Novo Nordisk A/S (NVO): Free Stock Analysis Report Eli Lilly and Company (LLY): Free Stock Analysis Report
Medscape
19-05-2025
- Health
- Medscape
Pregnancy Health Affects Child's Long-Term Blood Pressure
Children of mothers with hypertension, diabetes, or obesity had systolic and diastolic blood pressure readings that were 4.88 and 1.90 percentile points higher, respectively, than those of children whose mothers did not have these conditions. METHODOLOGY: Researchers analyzed data from a program monitoring environmental influences on child health outcomes and examined three common maternal cardiometabolic risk factors during pregnancy: Prepregnancy obesity, gestational diabetes, and hypertensive disorders of pregnancy. The analysis included over 30 years of data starting from 1994; a total of 12,480 mother-offspring pairs were included, 44.4% of which had a risk factor. Women had a mean maternal age of 29.9 years; 52.3% were White, 18.7% were Hispanic, 15.5% were Black, 7% were Asian, and 5.8% identified as being of another race or ethnicity. Information about the mother's heart health, blood pressure, and weight was collected from medical records and questionnaires. Researchers measured the systolic and diastolic blood pressures of each infant, adjusting for age, sex, and height. TAKEAWAY: In all, 5537 of the mothers had at least one heart or metabolic health issue, the most common being obesity before pregnancy (24.6%), high blood pressure during pregnancy (13.6%), and gestational diabetes (6.5%). Children born to mothers with any cardiometabolic risk factor showed higher systolic blood pressure (95% CI, 3.97-5.82) and higher diastolic blood pressure (95% CI, 1.15-2.64) at first measurement than those born to mothers without any risk factors. Among 6015 children with multiple blood pressure measurements, those whose mothers had cardiometabolic risk factors experienced larger increases in blood pressure from ages 2 to 18 years, with systolic pressure increasing by 0.2-0.8 percentiles each year and diastolic pressure increasing by 0.5-1.0 percentiles each year. IN PRACTICE: 'In the face of declining generational cardiovascular health in the overall US population, our results suggest that crucial next steps should include escalating interventions to prevent obesity and enhanced screening and treatment of gestational diabetes and HDP [hypertensive disorders of pregnancy] in childbearing populations,' the researchers reported. 'Such a move might not only protect mothers from long-term cardiovascular disease risk themselves but also shift the population distribution toward healthier endpoints in the next generations,' they added. SOURCE: This study was led by Zhongzheng Niu, PhD, of the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. It was published online on May 8 in JAMA Network Open . LIMITATIONS: The researchers grouped pregnancy-related problems associated with high blood pressure, although different subtypes may affect a child's blood pressure in various ways. Body mass index was used to estimate body fat but was noted to be an imperfect measure. This study did not have details on how much weight mothers gained during pregnancy, their diet, or how active they were. DISCLOSURES: One or more study authors reported receiving grants from the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Eli Lilly and personal fees from the American Thoracic Society; the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; the Parker B. Francis Council of Scientific Advisors; and Pfizer.
CBC
08-05-2025
- Health
- CBC
McMaster study links ultra-processed food to range of health risks and calls for more affordable whole foods
New research out of McMaster University in Ontario has directly linked consumption of ultra-processed foods – a category that includes not just traditional junk foods, but items marketed as healthy as well – to several health issues. The paper was written by McMaster University kinesiology researchers and published in the peer-reviewed journal Nutrition and Metabolism on Wednesday. The researchers found that consumption of ultra-processed foods (UPFs) was linked with correlating levels of high blood pressure and cholesterol, and was not affected by an individual's age, size and level of activity. Higher consumption of these processed foods is also linked to higher levels of triglycerides, "a type of fat found in the blood which, in high amounts, contributes to risk of heart disease, stroke and other diseases," study co-author and PhD student Angelina Baric told CBC Hamilton. She also said the research shows that processing foods changes how available the foods' nutrients are to the body and that higher consumption meant higher risk of health issues in every demographic researchers looked at. Many links between the consumption of these foods and the cardiometabolic risk factors "remained significant even after adjusting for [Body Mass Index], suggesting that ultra-processed foods may influence health through mechanisms beyond weight gain, such as inflammation, insulin resistance, and poor metabolic regulation – all well-established predictors of heart disease and type 2 diabetes," McMaster said in a press release. "The associations persisted even after adjusting for physical activity, smoking, the total amount of food consumed and socioeconomic factors including income and education," said the release. What is ultra-processed food? Ultra-processed foods are typically considered pre-packaged items that contain "ingredients you wouldn't use in home cooking, such as additives, emulsifiers, flavour enhancers and colours," Baric said. Examples include potato chips, hot dogs, deli meat and frozen foods. Baric said these foods often contain "substances that are extracted from whole foods rather than whole foods themselves." They are often high in sodium, sugar and saturated fat, she added. Even seemingly healthy foods such as protein bars and breakfast cereal largely fall under this category, Baric said. Her team's research found that people with lower incomes were likely to eat more of these foods, but she says those of higher socioeconomic status might be more likely to consume processed foods targeted at the wellness and workout markets, such as protein powder, protein bars or energy drinks. "Those are also ultra-processed," she said. "There's still a lot of additives added to these foods." Making whole foods more accessible is key: report The term "ultra-processed foods" is distinct from "processed foods," which typically refers to items with less than five ingredients, such as canned vegetables. "Those might contain just oil, water, salt and peas," Baric said, noting canned tuna, some cheese and some types of bread also fall in this category. Both of those terms stand in contrast with "whole foods," which are foods that arrive to the consumer in their natural state, such as vegetables, fruits, and animal products like meat or eggs. Improving affordability of these foods is one of the key recommendations of the report. "We found UPF intakes to be greatest amongst households with lower income and education," states the study, which also says men eat more UPFs than women. "Targeted public health campaigns aimed at improving consumer awareness, particularly among these higher risk groups, standardized front-of-package labeling, restrictions on UPF marketing, and improving accessibility and affordability of more healthful, whole foods could help reduce UPF intake." 'Bodies are seeing these as non-foods' The "landmark" study was the first in Canada to use "leverage population-based and robust biomarker data to examine this relationship," McMaster said. The research team also includes Baric's PhD supervisor Anthea Christoforou, the paper's senior author, and Vasanti S. Malik, of the University of Toronto's Department of Nutritional Sciences. They analyzed data from more than 6,000 adults across Canada, collected by Statistics Canada and Health Canada through the Canadian Health Measures Survey. Baric said that this detailed data set includes a wide range of data such as height, weight and blood and urine test results, and is "a nationally representative sample of Canadians." Christoforou said their results show that it's not just "the nutritional composition of a food" that matters to how healthy it is. "It may be about the additives. The way the food is prepared. It's related to the packaging and the marketing of that food. All these things come together to create this food environment that really affects the healthfulness of our diets," she said in the McMaster release. She also noted that consumption of ultra-processed foods is linked to the presence of C-reactive protein, which the liver produces in response to inflammation, as well as an increase of white blood cells. "These two biomarkers indicate that these foods are causing an inflammatory response in our bodies," she said. "In a sense, this suggests that our bodies are seeing these as non-foods, as some kind of other element."
