Novo Nordisk has agreed to cut the price of its obesity drug Wegovy as part of a deal with the Trump administration announced Thursday.
Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg via Getty Images
People who rely on Medicare for their health insurance will soon be able to get powerful drugs for obesity and Type 2 diabetes with a $50 monthly copay under two new agreements the Trump administration announced Thursday.
President Trump and his team announced deals with Novo Nordisk, which makes Ozempic and Wegovy, and Eli Lilly, which makes Mounjaro and Zepbound, from the Oval Office.
The deals are part of a broader initiative the administration calls MFN drug pricing. This is an attempt to lower drug prices in America and achieve the same or lower prices as other developed countries.
“We believe that these deals over two years … based on our health improvements, we will be budget neutral,” Dr. Mehmet Oz, who heads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said during a news conference. Although access to medicines will increase, their use will reduce spending on other health services. “These drugs won't cost us any money,” Oz said. “American taxpayers will get their money back.”
The companies have committed to offering their popular obesity and type 2 diabetes drugs to Medicare and Medicaid for $245 a month, and copays for Medicare beneficiaries will be set at $50 a month starting in April. State Medicaid programs would have to participate separately.
The programs already cover the companies' drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration to treat type 2 diabetes, but the agreements would also cover them for some overweight or obese patients.
There are some restrictions, according to senior officials who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity ahead of the White House announcement. Drugs will only be covered if patients have:
- body mass index over 27 and established prediabetes or cardiovascular disease;
- a body mass index greater than 30 and uncontrolled hypertension, kidney disease, or heart failure; or
- body mass index more than 35.
“This is not about losing weight,” a senior administration official said during a briefing. “This is about making America healthier. It's about preventing stroke. It's about preventing heart attacks and disease. end stage renal failure“
“Lowering the cost and leveraging the reach of Medicare and Medicaid to expand access to breakthrough weight-loss drugs is a transformative step in the fight against chronic disease and obesity,” said Dr. Bobby Mukkamala, president of the American Medical Association.
Like previous deals with Pfizer and AstraZeneca, the agreements with Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly include lower prices in Medicaid, a commitment to launch new drugs in the U.S. at prices similar to other developed countries, and discounts on drugs for patients paying for them without insurance, which will be available through TrumpRx.gov.
The deals with Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly also include a promise to offer starting doses of their upcoming obesity pills—if they receive FDA approval—at $149 a month to people with Medicare, Medicaid and TrumpRx. Eli Lilly said in a press release that it has also submitted an application for the voucher to the FDA, which could speed up its review and approval.
Current injectable drugs will be available through TrumpRx without insurance for an average of $350 a month — compared with the roughly $500 the companies are asking patients to buy directly today. Over the next 24 months, those prices will drop to $245, officials said.
Specifically, Eli Lilly says it will reduce the existing direct-to-consumer price of Zepbound by $50, bringing the price for an initial dose to $299 per month and $449 for higher doses.
“I think manufacturers were open to it partly for political reasons, but it also meant just a dramatic increase in the number of patients,” said Geoffrey Joyce, a health economist and director of health policy at the USC Schaeffer Center.
Additionally, in exchange for these commitments, Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk will receive a three-year waiver of certain tariffs.
The White House unveiled its plan for TrumpRx and the first the deal with Pfizer will take place on September 30. It also announced a deal with AstraZeneca on October 10 and with EMD Serono on October 16, although that deal only included EMD Serono's fertility drugs, not cancer or multiple sclerosis drugs.
All the deals followed the May decree, and in the summer letters were sent to 17 pharmaceutical companies urging them to voluntarily lower prices.
The TrumpRx website is expected to launch sometime in 2026 and will direct consumers to pharmaceutical companies' direct-to-consumer websites to fulfill orders.
