The weight loss injection Wegovy from the Danish pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk has also been approved in the USA to prevent heart attacks and strokes in high-risk patients. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said on Friday that Wegovy is now approved to “reduce the risk of fatal cardiovascular events, heart attacks and strokes in adults with cardiovascular disease and obesity or overweight.”
FDA representative John Sharretts said this patient population has a higher risk of serious cardiovascular complications. “Providing a treatment option that has been proven to reduce cardiovascular risk is an important advance in public health.”
Patients in the USA can now hope for a decisive advantage: the additional FDA approval should significantly increase the number of people for whom health insurance covers the costs of Wegovy. Many insurance companies will not cover the cost of a drug that is only approved for weight loss. With the new approval, there are new requirements for health insurance in the USA. My colleague Nicole Heißmann wrote down here what the current situation is in Germany.
Novo Nordisk initially caused a sensation with the diabetes drug Ozempic, which became very popular as a weight-loss injection. Later, the Danish pharmaceutical giant launched Wegovy, which contains the same active ingredient as Ozempic in a different dosage and was specifically approved by US authorities to treat obesity.
Read more about the weight loss injection here in the big stern cover story from November 2023.
