If these are the numbers (and I don’t doubt you), the insurance company cut a bad deal with the manufacturer.
Definitely not, but I’m not sure any insurers are allowing people who aren’t overweight/obese to take these products.
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Individual insurance companies don’t control enough lives to have strong price negotiating power. The exception is Medicare, but congress, in a blatant, corrupt giveaway to pharma, forbids them to negotiate. The VA is allowed to negotiate and gets much better pricing.
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like I said earlier, life-style…
Since the medication is being used for your diabetes, does your insurance cover it?
Maybe you said and I didn’t see it.
My husband is on an expensive biologic medication. Our insurance covers it but his physician has to requalify him every year. Husband also has to see his doctor every 3 months and the prescription is for only those 3 months.
I feel very fortunate because his disease reacts very well to his medication.
Unfortunately once my husband hits Medicare, he will have to switch to another biologic because Medicare doesn’t cover his. Hopefully it works as well as the medication he’s on now.
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What I’m saying is if the drug works for weight loss and the person loses the 50 pounds or whatever, then the person is no longer overweight or diabetic. But, the person still needs to be on the medication to maintain the weight loss (according to the article). If the person stops taking the medication, it is likely for the weight to return, so then the person would have to go back on the medication. A never ending cycle.
The drug is being prescribed off label for weight LOSS, but it will have to be prescribed for maintenance too. That will really be off label.
I understood what you meant. There are not different degrees of off-label. There are plenty of data showing Wegovy keeps weight off if it’s used for maintenance once a target weight is achieved…so that is no surprise to the insurers (or physicians who are doing all the off-label prescribing)
Yes, life-style gets them there, but once overweight, there are legitimate medical reasons to help them lose weight/maintain a normal weight (and for insurers to pay for that).
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They absolutely do. I have seen it with my own eyes (working in the industry for decades).
It’s not as simple as this. There’s plenty of evidence that some people put on weight far easier than others including studies on spouses who eat the exact same diet and have radically different habitus.
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Semiglutide is sold under brand names Wegovy (for weight loss) and Ozempic (for type 2 diabetes). So using the Wegovy branded version for weight loss would be on-label.
However, to the extent that semiglutide is production constrained, demand for Wegovy for weight loss could cause supply issues felt by those using Ozempic for type 2 diabetes.
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well sure, everyone is different and that is also true in every population around the world. But that still does not explain why the US is the most overweight in the OECD.
The “benefits” of success and the “modern” American diet.
Interestingly, Colorado is almost always the thinnest state as measured by average BMI and Mississippi is the heaviest. Colorado is now as fat as Mississippi was 30 years ago. Nuts!
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It’s the craft beers, I swear! 
And the food that goes with them. Plus, all that pot smoking and the edibles… 
I believe! 
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Doctor put my wife on one of the “TV commercial drugs” for type II diabetes that also causes weight loss. It made her so sick to her stomach he took her off. Is the weight loss because these drugs make it so you don’t eat as much because your stomach hurts??? We wonder.
One of the effects is to make you feel full so you eat less, and that can cause nausea.
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Yea, when we (and many other families part of same corporate transfer) moved from NY to CO 30 years ago, CO really had a noticeably fitter/thinner population. Since though there have been plenty of “transplants” from other states and a general US shift toward sedentary lifestyle.
Decided to look at 2023 data. CO still has relatively low obesity rates but as mentioned above worse than a few decades ago.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/obesity-rate-by-state
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A family member tried Wegovy and it’s been a big improvement for him. Lost 35 pounds easily. There is nausea if you eat too much but the hungry food obsessed thinking is gone. He stayed on the lowest dose. This is not like previous dieting at all.
My take is we live in an artificial environment today where we are surrounded by food. Evolution wanted us looking for food all the time to survive. But instincts have gone haywire in modern society.
I hope these meds can change how we all approach weight loss. It’s like the days when anxiety and pain relief meds were introduced. Sure, you can willpower your way past symptoms but the meds work for people.
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Just a note–Wegovy is not an off-label prescription when used for weight loss. That is its primary intention. It is the same medication as Ozempic, true, but in the Wegovy form, it is a weight-loss medication–not off-label.
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I actually did a continuing education program on PBMs and how they dramatically raise the cost of health care.
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