Patients who are prescribed Wegovy or Ozempic can now use GoodRx to access the medications at just $499 a month if they skip insurance. This is not the first time Novo has partnered with a pharmacy to offer the blockbuster drugs.
A little over a month after Novo Nordisk abandoned a program with Hims & Hers that provided its weight loss drugs at a lower cost, the Danish pharma is giving it another shot, this time with GoodRx.
The companies announced a partnership on Monday that would offer the GLP-1s Ozempic and Wegovy to self-paying customers at $499 per month. This includes all strengths of the medicines in pen form. This is the first time that the drugs have been offered at this price, according to the Monday release.
Patients who are prescribed the medicines can now use GoodRx to access them at the reduced price if they opt not to use insurance. Dave Moore, executive vice president of U.S. operations at Novo, said the new initiative aims to improve access “at an unprecedented price.”
This is not the first time Novo has partnered with a pharmacy to offer the drugs. In April, the pharma teamed up with Hims & Hers to have the telehealth provider offer the GLP-1s on its platform at $599 per month. But the deal quickly went sour, as Hims continued to offer compounded versions of the medicine. Novo backed out in July, accusing the telehealth provider of “deceptive promotion and selling of illegitimate, knockoff versions of Wegovy that put patient safety at risk.”
Novo has been struggling to regain its lead in the GLP-1 space, as rival Eli Lilly marks gains quarter-after-quarter. Wegovy just got a nice boost thanks to an FDA approval in metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) on Friday. The therapy was also added to CVS’ formulary in July.
Novo is eagerly anticipating an FDA decision for a 25 mg oral version of semaglutide, the active ingredient in both Wegovy and Ozempic, to be used for obesity treatment. A Phase III readout for semaglutide in Alzheimer’s disease is also expected later this year.
