Diabetes
The layoffs will heavily affect Vertex’s operations in Rhode Island, where the biotech will consolidate three facilities into one.
Given the evidence, the committee has recommended that the labels for Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and Ozempic be updated to include the “very rare” risk of non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy.
After a tense exchange, Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) told Kennedy that by implementing sweeping cuts to the HHS, he is “enacting his budget,” which “Congress has not passed.”
The FDA in February formally declared the end of the semaglutide shortage, which Novo Nordisk expects will help improve the market position of Wegovy. But Eli Lilly’s Zepbound is quickly gaining ground, with sales just $300 million behind Wegovy in Q1.
To say, as CEO David Ricks did, that this was a good quarter, is an understatement. Mounjaro in diabetes brought in $3.84 billion for the quarter while Zepbound in weight loss booked $2.31 billion.
Novo Nordisk filed for approval of an oral, 25-mg formulation of its weight loss blockbuster “earlier this year,” according to a company spokesperson.
Eli Lilly’s shares shot up 11% pre-market on Thursday after orforglipron became the first small-molecule GLP-1 drug to ace a late-stage study in type 2 diabetes, eliciting significant reductions in body weight and improvements in glucose control.
Despite a $400 million impairment charge, analysts say the removal of a drug-device combo from its portfolio is not a huge loss for Vertex given that the company has a more advanced type 1 diabetes candidate in zimislecel.
The latest data showed 15.7% weight loss in patients with diabetes after 68 weeks. In December 2024, CagriSema returned another disappointing readout for Novo, eliciting weight-loss of 22.7% in patients without diabetes, below the pharma’s prior projection of 25%.
Despite comments made by a Novo Nordisk official this week, the company confirmed to BioSpace that it has no additional clinical trials of its GLP-1 drugs in addiction beyond a Phase II trial testing semaglutide and two other drugs with alcohol use as a secondary endpoint.
PRESS RELEASES