Rethinking the Dosing of Obesity Medicines with AMG 133

We learned recently that questions about the need for ongoing dosing with obesity medicines raise discomforting thoughts. After all, obesity is a chronic disease, so we can’t dispute the need for continued daily or weekly doses with obesity medicines.

Or can we? Amgen seems to think we can.

Monthly Dosing?
Induction and Maintenance?

With a new publication in Nature Metabolism, Amgen scientists offer data to suggest we can start thinking about more occasional strategies for doses of highly effective obesity medicines. They tell us:

“AMG 133 had an acceptable safety and tolerability profile along with pronounced dose-dependent weight loss. In the multiple ascending dose cohorts, weight loss was maintained for up to 150 days after the last dose.”

The generic name for AMG 133 is maridebart cafraglutide. It has a much zippier brand name – MariTide.

Discomforting Thoughts

These data will prompt a lot of discomforting thoughts. Is it possible that dosing for obesity medicines might not even need to be monthly? Might we move toward thinking about inducing a remission of obesity and then following up with intermittent maintenance doses of a potent obesity medicine? Obesity researcher Randy Seeley says we should:

“The most interesting thing that is in that data is the hint that when you take the molecule away, you do not get the level of weight rebound that you would expect.

“For me, the most important thing that we could do is to get closer to one and done versions of this. The notion that we could build pharmaceutical interventions that would have long lasting effects beyond the status of the drug is incredibly intriguing.”

This is uncomfortable. But we like uncomfortable thoughts that challenge the status quo.

Click here to read the paper in Nature Metabolism, here, here, and here for further reporting.

Labors of the Months, calendar of illustrations by the Limbourg brothers / WikiArt

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February 6, 2024