France for patients: Take the weight loss drug Wegovy with your money

The anti-obesity drug Wegovy is now available in France – but the government has not given it clear approval.

Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk, which also makes the type 2 diabetes drug Ozempic, said this week that Wegovy will now be marketed in France for obesity patients. So far, 10,000 French people have received it with the aim of getting it quickly, said a company spokesperson.

Wegovy is which is expected to cost money patients €270 to €330 per month, but the French health insurance program will not cover the bill and patients will have to pay it themselves. It said the drug should only be used as a second-line treatment if diet and exercise alone are not enough to help patients lose weight.

Meanwhile, France’s drug safety agency has said that people must get their first prescription from a bariatrician to ensure that Wegovy is not misused for “pure” reasons. eg people who are not overweight and underweight – health related issues.

Weight Loss Drugs ‘Not the Holy Grail’

Wegovy is one of a new class of weight loss drugs called GLP-1 receptor agonists, which work by suppressing a person’s appetite and have become very popular in recent years.

Health analysts expect global sales of these anti-obesity drugs to reach $131 billion (€117.4 billion) in 2028, and the deficit is recorded across the European Union from 2022.

But despite their commercial success, medicine is not the “Holy Grail,” Dr. Jens-Christian Holm, associate professor at the University of Copenhagen and head of the Pediatric Obesity Clinic at Holbæk University Hospital, Denmark, told Euronews Health.

“There are problems there. They cost a lot of money. There are side effects, and they don’t work when you stop using them”.

France is not the only country that takes medicine seriously. For example, a 1980s legal restrictions Germany’s national health system pays for drugs that focus on “lifestyle” issues such as obesity, smoking cessation, hair growth and erectile dysfunction.

That means that Novo Nordisk is still selling Wegovy in Germany from 2023only patients with insurance or those willing to pay out-of-pocket can get it. The highest rate costs €302 per month, said a company spokesperson.

Wegovy is also rarely used in Denmark – Novo Nordisk’s home country – in part because Danish health authorities estimate it would cost 6 million Danish kroner (about €805,000) to prevent the incident. one of the heart.

Holm, who believes that weight loss drugs should be reserved for people who have difficulty managing obesity in other ways, said that many doctors do not fully understand these drugs and prescribe them too easily. That can make it difficult to cover them for a real beneficiary.

“The ones paying the price for this confusion and lack of knowledge are primarily the patients,” Holm said.

Meanwhile, in the United Kingdom, the health service recommends that people take Wegovy for longer than two years, and will not pay for long-term use due to concerns with the effectiveness of the drug price.

But since people who stop taking the medication often regain weight, obesity researchers, policymakers and drug companies are debating whether that period should be extended.

Dr Adam Collins, associate professor of nutrition at the University of Surrey in the UK, said it needed to be clear which patients would benefit from the drug – such as people with other health issues such as insulin resistance or heart risk conditions – and that doctors need to help them. know how to treat patients after the two-year mark, for example by gradually reducing their doses or helping them implement other lifestyle changes to keep their weight off.

“Keep it [the drug] for those who need it most,” Collins said.

Making products ‘more accessible’

Wegovy is also available in Norway, Spain, Switzerland, Italy and Iceland, and outside of Europe in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Japan, the United States, and the United Arab Emirates – with more launches on the way, a Novo Nordisk spokesperson said. said.

Other countries are waiting to see what happens abroad. Although Wegovy is not yet available in the Netherlands, the Dutch authorities are already insisting on a possible idea in their budget.

Last year, Novo Nordisk asked to be added to the national health insurance scheme – which is mandatory for all citizens – but a government advisory group warned in July that there were “significant doubts” about and the long-term effects of the drug and that. it could cost the country €1.3 billion a year – a figure that is “socially irresponsible”.

“Based on the large number of people who may be eligible for treatment with weight-loss drugs, including semaglutide, a broad public discussion of the use of these products is out of the question,” the Dutch health care agency said the notification to the health worker. Fleur Agema in July.

These budget concerns may change in the future as Novo Nordisk’s management has shown they can offer flexible pricing to convince countries to take the drug. New drugs are expected to enter the market in the coming years and may help lower prices.

“Novo Nordisk continues to explore options with health services to make our products more accessible to more people, especially those with high unmet medical need,” a spokesperson said. of the company told Euronews Health.

Meanwhile, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) said this summer that Wegovy could also be used to prevent major heart problems such as heart attack and stroke in obese people.

In clinical trialssemaglutide – the active ingredient in Wegovy – was associated with a reduction of 20 percent in these cases.

The decision of the EMA can help to convince European health organizations to cover Wegovy for heart problems, not just for weight loss – something that the German authorities already have. they say they can do that.

As the debate rages over whether or not to pay for drugs, Holm hopes obesity will be treated like any other medical issue, pointing out that cancer drugs, growth hormones, and other treatments some arthritis also cost a lot of money.

“It’s this cultural thing about obesity [that makes people say] He said: ‘No, thank you.’ “Of course it’s not fair”.