Novo Nordisk CEO sees US supply curbs on weight-loss drug Wegovy into 2024

[August 10, 2023]  By Nikolaj Skydsgaard and Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen

COPENHAGEN (Reuters) -Novo Nordisk's limits on U.S. supplies of starter doses of its hugely popular Wegovy weight-loss drug will last into next year even as the Danish drugmaker spends billions boosting output, its CEO told Reuters on Thursday.

Demand for Wegovy will be very high for the foreseeable future and higher than the Danish drugmaker can supply, Lars Fruergaard Jorgensen said in an interview after the company raised its full-year financial forecasts.

Earlier on Thursday, the company said it would continue to restrict U.S. supplies of starter doses of Wegovy as the company struggles to keep up with soaring demand.

Reuters has reported that larger doses are also in short supply. Novo has denied this, but when asked about this on Thursday Jorgensen said there may be shortages.

"I just have to acknowledge that the demand is so strong that despite the fact that we are ramping up manufacturing and producing more and more, there will be times where patients rush at the same time to the same pharmacies and there'll be shortages," he said.

That's a "challenge" for patients not getting medicines, he said

The constraints on supplies will spur concerns about how the company may meet even greater demand for the weekly injection after trial data showed heart benefits for patients on Wegovy.

A selection of injector pens for the Wegovy weight loss drug are shown in this photo illustration in Chicago, Illinois, U.S., March 31, 2023. REUTERS/Jim Vondruska/Illustration/File Photo

Jorgensen said, however, that the regulatory process to expand the label to include the heart benefits identified in the late-stage study called SELECT would likely take a "good part of next year".

The company expects to apply for regulatory approval for an expanded label indication in the U.S. and European Union later this year.

"It'll take some time before we get it on label," Jorgensen said.

Speaking to Reuters in a separate interview, Novo's executive vice president of development Martin Lange said the company would present full results of the trial at the American Heart Association conference in Philadelphia in November.

The regulatory submission will take place independently of that, he said.

(Reporting by Nikolaj Skydsgaard and Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen in Copenhagen; writing by Josephine Mason in London; editing by Jason Neely and Mark Potter)

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