(Reuters) -A shortage of Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk’s popular weight-loss and diabetes drugs, Wegovy and Ozempic, has been resolved, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s website showed on Friday.
The resolution could potentially restrict how telehealth programs offer cheaper versions known as compounded drugs and comes two months after the health regulator said there was no shortage of Eli Lilly’s weight-loss and diabetes drugs.
Demand for compounded drugs – custom medicines that are made by combining, mixing or altering drug ingredients – has boomed in the U.S. due to a tight supply of famous treatments from Novo and Eli Lilly.
U.S. regulations allow compounding pharmacies to copy brand-name medicines that are in short supply, but do not allow them to make the drugs “regularly or in inordinate amounts”.
Both Novo and Lilly have invested billions to ramp-up supply of their treatments, which has lagged demand for most of last year.
All doses of Novo’s diabetes treatment Ozempic and weight-loss drug Wegovy were listed as available on the FDA’s website in October, but the treatments were not taken off the official shortage list.
The health regulator usually assesses if all back-orders have been filled before deciding on whether a shortage has been resolved.
Several companies, such as Hims and Hers and WeightWatchers, offer compounded semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy. Shares of Hims and Hers tumbled 19% in premarket trading.
(Reporting by Bhanvi Satija in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur)
