As the popularity of weight loss drugs has increased, so have calls to poison control as people, including children, overdose on the medications. GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Zepbound are designed to be injected, typically once a week. That means the medications are set to remain in the body for that long, which can have devastating consequences if a child gets their hands on the medicine. Weight loss drugs come with side effects, including gastrointestinal distress. As with most medications, those side effects are worse if people take more of the drug than prescribed. In most cases, that’s due to people taking their next dose too early, incorrectly measuring a dose or thinking that extra medication will help them lose weight more quickly.
Novo Nordisk said Wednesday it will launch some doses of its oral semaglutide for diabetes under the brand name Ozempic pill in the second quarter of this year. The company said the FDA has approved Ozempic tablets in 1.5 milligram, 4 milligram, and 9 milligram doses. The new Ozempic name is intended to help patients and healthcare professionals more easily recognize the available treatment options for type 2 diabetes. Semaglutide tablets at 3 mg, 7 mg, and 14 mg doses have been available under the brand name Rybelsus for diabetes. The pill is also approved to reduce the risk of certain cardiovascular conditions in adults with type 2 diabetes who are at high risk for these events. The FDA had approved the new doses based on a bioequivalence study and the clinical trial data for Rybelsus, Novo said.
The maker of Wegovy and Ozempic, Novo Nordisk, has predicted a sharp drop in revenues this year owing to what its boss described as a "painful" push by Donald Trump to lower U.S. weight-loss drug prices, rising competition, and the loss of important patent protections. Denmark's Novo, once the poster-child for the growth in weight-loss treatments, said sales this year were likely to fall between 5% and 13%, ending years of double-digit gains, despite the promising launch of its new Wegovy pill in the U.S. Its share price plummeted 17% on Wednesday, erasing all gains so far this year. In the past year the stock has lost nearly 50% of its value.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who cast a critical vote to confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of the Health and Human Services Department, on Monday blasted the reduction of the childhood immunization schedule by Kennedy and the CDC. The CDC announced Monday it would be reducing the number of recommended vaccines for children from 17 to 11, putting the U.S. in line with that of other developed countries like Denmark, a nation which anti-vaccine skeptics and critics often cite as a model to be emulated.
A federal judge has granted a temporary restraining order that will stop HHS' much-contested 340B rebate model from launching as planned on 1st January. Judge Lance Walker sided with the American Hospital Association and other plaintiffs in the lawsuit, brought in a Maine district court, which claims that the new model was unlawful and would add 'hundreds of millions' of dollars to the annual costs of hospitals serving some of the most vulnerable people in the U.S.
A new drug may slow progression of — and even reverse — symptoms of a rare form of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, a new study published Monday finds. The drug, tofersen, targets a very specific mutation — SOD1 — which applies to only 2% of the ALS population. Among this group, the drug has the potential to slow muscle degeneration by targeting SOD1 mRNA, genetic material that tells the body how to make proteins, and reduces the proteins being made.