How the price of Lilly’s weight management drug could fuel its rivalry with Novo Nordisk

Eli Lil­ly’s high­ly an­tic­i­pat­ed weight loss ri­val Zep­bound is set to hit shelves this year at a steep dis­count to No­vo Nordisk’s We­govy and with per­haps bet­ter ef­fi­ca­cy, set­ting the stage for a fierce com­pe­ti­tion over ac­cess and sup­ply.

Zep­bound, which re­ceived FDA ap­proval on Wednes­day, is priced at $1,059.87 per month, which Lil­ly says is a 20% dis­count to We­govy’s 2.4 mg in­jec­tions.

The drug is priced “pret­ty much at par­i­ty” to its type 2 di­a­betes med­ica­tion Moun­jaro, which con­tains the same ac­tive in­gre­di­ent and has a list price of $1,023.04 per fill, said Pa­trik Jon­s­son, in­com­ing pres­i­dent of Lil­ly Di­a­betes and Obe­si­ty, at a UBS event Wednes­day, ac­cord­ing to an Al­phaSense tran­script.

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