The upcoming release of the UK’s first weight-loss pill, Wegovy, has been described as “game-changing” by a leading pharmacy provider.
“We’ve already seen record demand ahead of the expected launch”, said James O’Loan, chief executive of Chemist4U. With the majority of people expressing interest in the new obesity treatment not being previous users of weight-loss injections, this indicated that the new pill “could widen access to millions of people across the country”.
How does it work?
Made by Danish pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk, the pill is an oral version of weight-loss medicine Wegovy, containing the same active ingredient, semaglutide.
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Where GLP-1 injections “pass directly into the bloodstream, the pill has to first be absorbed through the stomach”. This is possible through “scientific innovation, creating a way of encapsulating semaglutide and shielding it from stomach acid”, said The Telegraph’s health and medical journalist David Cox.
As with injections, the Wegovy pill “mimics the effects of a gut hormone called GLP-1, released after eating, which regulates appetite and signals a feeling of fullness”.
The pill is taken daily, compared to the weekly injection, and comes in different doses which can be steadily increased each month.
How effective is it?
Early tests suggest it has a similar effect to injectable Wegovy. After 64 weeks, adults taking the pill lost an average of 14% to 17% of body weight, with about one in three people losing 20% or more.
Regulatory guidelines from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency state that only people classified as clinically obese, with a Body Mass Index (BMI) of more than 30, or those who are overweight (BMI of 27-30) with at least one weight-related health condition such as high blood pressure or type 2 diabetes, will be eligible to receive the drug.
How much will it cost?
To start with, it will be available in the UK only on prescription privately and not free on the NHS. While exact prices are yet to be set, Robert Bradshaw, a superintendent pharmacist at Oxford Online Pharmacy, told The Telegraph he expects the Wegovy pill to “come in roughly at the same price as the injections”.
“I suspect the pill will be priced somewhere around about £80 to start with, progressing to £130 [for the intermediate dose], and maybe £160 for the top dose.”
With other drug companies developing their own weight-loss pills, however, “competition could also drive down the costs of treatment, as first-generation drugs, or those that offer slightly poorer top-line results, command lower prices”, said The Economist. Some government-funded health systems are likely to make “population-scale deals in the coming years, which could broaden access” further.
Are there any side-effects?
“These are similar whatever the version and related to levels of the drugs in the blood rather than how they are administered,” said Dr Mark Porter in The Times. Common side effects include “nausea and vomiting (slightly more common with the pill version), diarrhoea and/or constipation and abdominal discomfort, but these generally settle once people get used to the medicine”.
The much rarer but more serious side-effects “such as gallbladder problems (stones), inflammation of the pancreas (pancreatitis) and visual problems (optic neuropathy) probably remain the same as with injectables”.
But with the latest NHS statistics suggesting 66% of all people over 16 in England are overweight, and with obesity rates “continuing to spiral”, doctors are “optimistic that the emergence of GLP-1 tablets can serve as a major boost to public health”, said The Telegraph.
And globally, if generic semaglutide were made available to everyone with obesity and diabetes, it could save between 2.1 million and 3.1 million lives a year, according to one model, said The Economist.
