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Showing Original Post only (View all)Newly Approved Drug Heralded As 'Game Changer' In The Growing National Obesity Crisis [View all]
Source: ABC News
(By Arielle Mitropoulos). The CDC says 42.4% of all adults in the United States suffer from obesity. A new weight-loss treatment is being heralded by some health experts as "groundbreaking," and a potential "game changer" in the growing epidemic of obesity.
Semaglutide, an injectable drug made by the pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk, was approved Friday by the Food and Drug Administration, for patients struggling with chronic obesity. "We don't use those terms lightly," Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine professor Dr. Robert F. Kushner, an obesity medicine specialist and trial investigator for the drug, told ABC News.
"I've been involved in the field for 40 years. The reason we think that way, it results in amount of weight loss of an average of 15% or more, which we have not seen before." Currently, 42.4% of all adults in the U.S. suffer from obesity, defined as having a body mass index at or above 30, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"Today's approval offers adults with obesity or overweight a beneficial new treatment option to incorporate into a weight management program," John Sharretts, deputy director of the Division of Diabetes, Lipid Disorders, and Obesity in the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said in a statement...(*Video has loud audio).
Read more: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/newly-approved-drug-heralded-game-changer-growing-national/story?id=78065574&cid=clicksource_4380645_1_heads_hero_live_headlines_hed
- Also: "U.S. FDA approves Novo Nordisk's semaglutide as obesity treatment," Reuters, June 4, 2021.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Friday approved Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk's (NOVOb.CO) once-weekly semaglutide drug as a treatment for obesity, a condition that affects nearly 70% of American adults.
The drugmaker said it was expecting to launch the drug, which would be sold under the brand name Wegovy, in the United States later in June 2021.
The regulatory nod is a big win for Novo, which has seen its core insulin business suffer from tough competition, prompting it to turn toward newer diabetes and obesity drugs to revive growth.
Novo's revenue growth has been driven by sales of its newer GLP-1 products, which imitate an intestinal hormone that stimulates insulin production, lowers appetite and increases feelings of fullness in patients...more.
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/novo-nordisk-semaglutide-gets-us-fda-approval-obesity-treatment-2021-06-04/