December 20, 2024 — Are we indeed reaching the end of the on-again, off-again supply shortage for GLP-1 obesity medicines? That seems to be what FDA signaled yesterday. The agency posted a brief statement, not only noting its determination that the tirzepatide shortage is “resolved,” but also saying the national GLP-1 supply has begun to stabilize. FDA is looking at […]
December 16, 2024 — The closing days of 2024 give us a moment to reflect on the stories that defined this year in obesity and health. It’s been a big year, with no shortage of news on this subject. But the major themes stand out very clearly. Health Outcomes Beyond Weight Loss This was the year that objective evidence […]
October 17, 2024 — On again, off again. With impressive nimbleness, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration reversed course on tirzepatide compounding in large-scale pharmacy facilities. On October 2, they told those facilities to knock it off. Late last week, the agency told them to carry on – for now. FDA was responding to a lawsuit filed by compounding […]
October 3, 2024 — Late yesterday, FDA announced that Lilly’s tirzepatide shortage is officially over. Both Mounjaro and Zepbound are fully available in all marketed strengths and dosage forms. “The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has determined the shortage of tirzepatide injection, a glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1) medication, has been resolved. Tirzepatide injection has been in shortage since 2022 […]
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August 17, 2024 — Never is a long time and repeatedly telling people NO can be a futile exercise. Thus, doctors are landing somewhere between no and maybe on the use of compounded obesity medicines. Some are seeing a rationale for for using them while others remain resolute in opposition to them. Shauna Levy is an obesity medicine physician […]
August 5, 2024 — Should we celebrate the news that, in FDA drug shortage listings, all forms of tirzepatide (Mounjaro and Zepbound) are listed as “available”? Is this a sign that we are on our way to the nightmarishly short supply of GLP1s will soon be behind us? Forgive us for being skeptical, but we’re not quite ready to […]
July 22, 2024 — A gray market for obesity medicines is thriving. The quality of the products in this market range from reasonable to sketchy to utterly unreliable. But millions of people are taking a chance on them. Big pharma companies innovated to bring fully vetted formulations of important medicines to market, spending billions of dollars to do it. […]
May 25, 2024 — We’ve been waiting for this. Back in October, headlines flashed the news that Novo Nordisk had stopped a big outcomes study of semaglutide and its effect on kidney failure and death. They stopped it because it had worked so well. Continuing to give a placebo to half the people in the study would have been […]
May 5, 2024 — “Drug compounding with semaglutide and tirzepatide is a public health emergency,” said a respected obesity medicine physician to us this week. They were right. Most of the compounded drugs people encounter when they are desperate to obtain these life-changing medicines are sketchy at best. This week, FDA announced the arrest of a TikToker for selling […]
January 16, 2024 — If you wonder why the Obesity Action Coalition, Obesity Medicine Association, and the Obesity Society all warn against using compounded versions of GLP-1 medicines for obesity, consider the boom and bust story of ACA Pharmacy in Nashville, Tennessee. After semaglutide went into shortage in 2022, it began doing a booming business with a compounded version […]
