Public Citizen Urges HHS to Unlock Generic Competition for Popular Weight Loss Drugs Ozempic and Wegovy

August 5, 2024

Public Citizen Urges HHS to Unlock Generic Competition for Popular Weight Loss Drugs Ozempic and Wegovy

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Biden-Harris Administration can secure historic savings to Medicare and Medicaid by authorizing generic competitors for semaglutide, sold under the brand names as Ozempicand Wegovy, according to a petition sent today by Public Citizen to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra. The petition's release comes as North Carolina's State Treasurer, Dale Folwell, also calls on the federal government to make the popular drug more affordable through patent licensing and generic competition.

"Skyrocketing use of these medications threatens to impose unprecedented financial consequences on federal health programs and patients due to the pricing abuses of the originator company, Novo Nordisk," notes the petition, which comes on the heels of scrutiny from the White House and Congress.

Medicare Part D's gross spending on Ozempicin 2022 was $4.628 billion for approximately 780,000 beneficiaries, which is approximately $6,000 per enrollee.

"Novo Nordisk's outrageous prices for these important drugs are depriving people of needed treatment and draining state treasuries," said Peter Maybarduk, director of Public Citizen's Access to Medicines Program.

"There's nothing patients on their own can do about this," Maybarduk said. "But the federal government has tools available - right now, under existing law - to facilitate generic competition for semaglutide and drive down prices."

Using existing law, the petition explains, the government should contract with generic producers to manufacture the treatment for use by Medicare, Medicaid and other government programs. Generics producers have already filed for semaglutide approval with FDA.

The authority to take such action is provided by 28 USC 1498 (known as Section 1498), Section 1498 permits the government to make use of patented inventions in exchange for paying reasonable compensation to the patent holder.

U.S. residents are charged excessively high prices by Novo Nordisk relative to residents in peer countries: The company charges Americans up to 15 times more for these drugs than their peers in Canada, Japan, or Europe. As noted in the petition, the pharmaceutical industry often asserts that exorbitantly high drug prices for Americans are necessary to recuperate sunk research and development costs. But a recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association concluded that Ozempicand Wegovy could be sustainably priced at less than $5 and $13 a month, respectively, based on their cost of manufacture, proving the pharmaceutical company's price gouging is blatantly egregious.

"There's no excuse for Novo Nordisk charging Americans multiples of what patients in other countries pay for semaglutide," said Maybarduk. "The federal government has the power to end Novo Nordisk's price gouging and it should do so, without delay."

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