The letter is the latest salvo in a battle over pricing that began after a study earlier this year found that Ozempic could be profitably made for less than $5 a month. The company charges $1,349.02 each month for Wegovy and $968.52 for Ozempic, which share the same ingredients but are sold under different brand names for obesity and diabetes. The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee led by Sanders launched an investigation into Novo’s pricing in late April.
Novo argued in the letter that it’s misplaced to focus on the list price because a portion is paid to middlemen in the complex US healthcare system. Looking only at the disparity between what it costs to make the drugs and their cost to payers is unfair, the company said, because it had to invest billions of dollars up-front to develop the medicines, a process that often takes more than a decade, involves thousands of volunteers in patient trials and can fail after years of work.
Novo said it spent well over $10 billion to develop GLP-1 medicines, a category that includes Ozempic and Wegovy, as well as its former best-seller Victoza.
Ozempic is expected to generate some $18 billion in sales this year, and Wegovy close to $9 billion, according to analysts. Much of that revenue will be from the US, where about 40% of adults are obese.
Sanders, an independent senator from Vermont, has increasingly sought to bring his pricing criticism home to Novo in Denmark. He submitted a letter to the country’s largest newspaper earlier this month asking Danes to pressure Novo to lower prices in the US to help battle obesity.
Novo cut the price of Ozempic in Denmark last month after the drug’s rising popularity led to a massive bill for the public healthcare system, which in turn restricted access to patients who can’t be treated with cheaper alternatives.
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