All of the weight-loss breakthroughs currently grabbing the headlines come from diabetes treatment, which is why Eli Lilly & Co.’s obesity drug is increasingly featured in the news at medical conferences such as the American Diabetes Association meeting next weekend.
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Novo Nordisk
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Zealand Pharma
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Ultimune
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others.
There will be news about the effectiveness of weight-loss drugs, drugs that target new hunger receptors, and drugs designed to lose weight but not muscle. Devices are also following the path of drugs from diabetes treatment to diet data, and investors are hoping that blood glucose monitors from Abbott Laboratories and Dexcom will be used by non-diabetics.
These drugs and medical devices have been the biggest movers and shakers in healthcare stocks over the past few years. Lilly and Novo have become the world’s most valuable pharmaceutical companies, with their stock prices rising more than 160% in the past two years thanks to the weight loss benefits of their GLP-1 drugs. Meanwhile, Dexcom has been one of the most active medical technology stocks.
Lilly currently markets tirzepatide as a diabetes treatment called Maunjaro and as a weight-loss drug called Zepbound. The injectable drug targets two cell surface receptors that affect hunger. At the conference, researchers will explain how the drug works by affecting appetite circuits in the brain to relieve sleep apnea.
At the meeting, people will hear about mid-stage studies of Lilly’s pill, which targets one hunger receptor, and Retatortide, an injectable drug that targets three hunger receptors simultaneously.
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Lilly and Novo charge more than $10,000 a year for their drugs, so insurers have tried to limit coverage to those in urgent need. To expand coverage, drug companies are testing their drugs for a number of conditions, including the heart, liver, kidneys and brain.
Novo’s presentation will detail results from Phase 3 trials of semaglutide, marketed as the diabetes drug Ozempic and the weight-loss drug Wegovy, in kidney disease and heart failure, and will also provide an update on its dual-receptor drug, Kajisema.
Other companies are rapidly pursuing the weight loss market. Several talks will discuss new data on Altimmune’s dual receptor drug; Denmark’s Zealand will present an early-stage drug that promises weight loss with minor side effects; and Regeneron will present phase 1 data on a drug that may reduce weight but not muscle mass.
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Abbott Labs is launching a patch-type device called Ringo this summer, the first blood glucose monitor that can be marketed to anyone interested in their metabolic health, including overweight people who are considered “prediabetic” and fitness enthusiasts. Raymond James analyst Jason Bedford said Abbott’s investor event at the conference on Saturday is likely to include more details about the product, as well as the company’s new monitoring patch for people with Type 2 diabetes who don’t need insulin.
Dexcom meets with investors on Sunday, while Bedford awaits news about its blood-glucose-monitoring patch, Stero, due to hit the shelves in August. Dexcom and Abbott will go head-to-head to determine how many of the nation’s 30 million people with Type 2 diabetes will pay out of pocket to benefit from continuous glucose monitoring, which is poorly covered by insurance.
Dexcom’s patch is approved for sale only to people with type 2 diabetes, but anyone can buy it, so it will be interesting to see Dexcom’s upcoming study published on the health benefits of blood glucose monitors for people with prediabetes, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates there are 100 million of them in the United States.
Contact Bill Alpert at william.alpert@barrons.com.
