On June 4, 2021, the Food and drug administration announced the extensive-expected acceptance of Wegovy, an injectable medicine taken the moment per week for fat management.

Wegovy acquired significant media consideration in the months preceding acceptance, with a New York Occasions post declaring it a “activity changer,” MedPage Currently reporting its “unparalleled results,” and the BBC announcing it could mark a “new period” in managing weight problems. Ongoing media protection proceeds to extol the efficacy of Wegovy as far better than any other medicine at present on the industry for bodyweight management. Such sensational headlines are commonplace in the media, so we have to inquire ourselves: is all the media notice genuinely warranted?

What is Wegovy and how does it operate?

Wegovy is the brand identify for the high-dose injectable peptide hormone molecule acknowledged as semaglutide, a medication that was formerly accepted by the Food and drug administration less than the brand names Rybelsus (oral) and Ozempic (lower-dose injection) for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. Injectable semaglutide removes the demanding guidelines for ingesting on an vacant tummy demanded by oral semaglutide, when the larger-dose Wegovy enables for superior crossing of the blood-brain barrier, which improves its body weight-decline efficacy.

Semaglutide is in a course of drugs identified as glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists, or GLP-1 RAs. GLP-1 is a hormone by natural means introduced in the gastrointestinal tract in response to nutrient intake. It has various results, which includes rising insulin release from the pancreas, slowing down abdomen emptying, and concentrating on receptors in the mind that lead to hunger reduction. This outcomes in a feeling of satiety, or fullness, lasting a great deal more time than doable with normal GLP-1 hormone concentrations.

Who can take Wegovy?

Wegovy, like all other prescription prescription drugs designated for the cure of weight problems, is accepted for use in all those with a system mass index (BMI) of 30 kg/m² or higher, or all those with a BMI of 27 kg/m² with a fat-related healthcare ailment this kind of as significant blood pressure, variety 2 diabetic issues, or significant cholesterol.

What are the risks and advantages of Wegovy?

Phase 3 medical trials of Wegovy, dubbed the Action (Semaglutide Cure Outcome in Folks with Being overweight) trials, were being conducted in a variety of scientific situations, each various a little bit in the analyze inhabitants and study structure. The broadly noted Stage 1 demo, the final results of which have been revealed in the New England Journal of Medication, shown an normal of 14.9% body bodyweight reduction soon after 68 weeks of treatment in all those assigned to the medicine group, versus only 2.4% weight loss in those assigned to the placebo group. The average pounds loss found with current anti-weight problems medications is generally about 5% to 9%, even though these engaged in life style and behavioral therapy by itself are envisioned to eliminate only 3% to 5% of their overall body body weight.

The most typical facet consequences of Wegovy are nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, and constipation. The medication also arrives with a warning for hazard of a particular tumor of the thyroid, and thus it is not advised for those with a own or spouse and children heritage of medullary thyroid cancer or a number of endocrine neoplasia sort 2 (a genetic problem affiliated with endocrine tumors). It really should be observed that tumors ended up only observed in animal studies, and not viewed in the human trials.

How long can you acquire Wegovy?

Wegovy is a person of six medicines presently permitted by the Food and drug administration for the very long-time period remedy of being overweight. As this sort of, it can be used for as long as it remains effective for weight loss and/or pounds servicing and is not producing intolerable aspect effects. The initially GLP-1 RA medicine to acquire Food and drug administration acceptance was exenatide in 2005 considering that then, several GLP-1 RAs have been approved and undergone prolonged-expression trials demonstrating possibly non-inferiority or superiority, when in comparison to placebo for major adverse cardiovascular functions these types of as heart assaults and stroke. The Find trial is the very long-expression cardiovascular results trial for Wegovy that aims to assess its outcomes on heart ailment and stroke in individuals with over weight and obesity it is currently ongoing and envisioned to be concluded in September 2023.

Anti-weight problems medication management: An evolving landscape

Wegovy is the hottest in a line of remedies, starting up with phentermine in 1959, that have reached Food and drug administration approval for the cure of obesity. Now there are 10 Food and drug administration-accepted anti-weight problems prescription drugs in the US: phentermine, diethylpropion, benzphetamine, phendimetrazine, orlistat, phentermine/topiramate ER (Qsymia), bupropion/naltrexone (Contrave), liraglutide (Saxenda), setmelanotide (Imcivree), and now semaglutide (Wegovy). Of take note, setmelanotide is only authorised for the remedy of weight problems brought about by precise, unusual genetic conditions. Other medicines such as metformin, zonisamide, and other GLP-1 RAs typically applied for treating diabetic issues are frequently prescribed “off label” and at the discretion of the prescriber for the procedure of weight problems.

Medicine treatment method of being overweight has been a tumultuous arena plagued by numerous occasions of therapeutics staying unable to show ample protection information to warrant Fda approval, these as rimonabant (Acomplia) or of adverse outcomes necessitating current market withdrawal, such as lorcaserin (Belviq), sibutramine (Meridia), dexfenfluramine (Redux), fenfluramine (Pondimin), and the infamous mixture treatment fen-phen — a drug which, inspite of its extraordinary reputation in the 1990s, was hardly ever in fact granted Food and drug administration approval. Unfortunately, the rocky anti-weight problems treatment landscape generally potential customers to distress between clinicians in utilizing the lots of protected and powerful resources we currently have for managing obesity, or worse, hesitance to tackle weight problems as a well being concern at all.

Spending for anti-obesity medicines

For those people who do prescribe anti-obesity pharmacotherapy, difficulties come up with the exorbitant price tag of some of the more recent therapeutics, as nicely as refusal of a lot of personal and public insurers to deal with anti-being overweight drugs. Often patients or their advocates may perhaps have results in lobbying their employers to decide in to insurance plan protection for being overweight management. Nonetheless, for all those on Medicare or Medicaid, there is presently absolutely no coverage for anti-obesity prescription drugs. Patients with no protection are still left with the decision of shelling out out of pocket for a decrease-price generic anti-weight problems medicine using a medication mainly supposed for treating other health-related problems this sort of as diabetes or seizures that may perhaps also help with weight reduction or, if their BMI and wellbeing status is significant enough to fulfill insurance policy demands, they could decide for bariatric surgical procedure, a a great deal much more greatly coated insurance coverage reward.

The Take care of and Decrease Obesity Act is a bill that was very first launched to Congress in 2012 and most recently reintroduced in 2021, with the aim of amending the Medicare Social Security Act to authorize insurance plan coverage of being overweight counseling solutions and Fda-authorized anti-obesity medicines. This remains the most significant hurdle in the obesity treatment landscape: getting sufficient invest in-in from authorities businesses, businesses, and insurers by convincing them that remedies concentrating on the most widespread continual disease in the US are basically truly worth paying out for.