A look at the logo of Novo Nordisk in the company's office in Bagsvaerd on the outskirts of Copenhagen, Denmark, March 8, 2024.
Tom Little | Reuters
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Novo Nordisk aims at his rivals Eli LillyWith a new obesity drug agreement.
On Monday, the Danish drug maker announced that it would pay up to 2 billion US dollars for the rights to an experimental medicine from Chinese pharmaceutical companies United Laboratories. The injectable treatment – UBT251 – is in an early development to treat obesity, type -2 -diabetes and other diseases so that it can take a few years to enter a market.
Novo Nordisk pays 200 million US dollars in advance and milestone payments of up to 1.8 billion US dollars and graded license fees. The deal gives the company exclusive rights to develop, manufacture and commercialize the drug worldwide, but not on the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.
Novo Nordisk joins a number of other pharmacists such as Merck and Astrazeneca, who have recently completed relatively cheap shops with Chinese biotech companies for obesity medication.
“While Trump's tariffs and trade war talks continue, it is remarkable that Pharma is still viewed on Chinese biotech names as a source for cheap early license agreements, in which great pharmaceuticals can examine the potential of new mechanisms with limited pre -information,” said the BMO Capital Markets Analyst Evan Seiger on Monday.
So what is different about the new drug?
It is a thirteen approach to promote weight loss and regulation of blood sugar. Most of the murmisiness treatments available in the trade aim at just one or two intestinal hormones to create these effects.
Activate Novo Nordisks Blockbuster Adipositas injection Wegovy and Diabetes Treatment Ozempic GLP-1. In the meantime, Eli Lilly's weight loss drug Zepbound and Diabetes Treatment Mounjaro are aiming both on GLP-1 and another intestinal hormone called Gip.
Researchers say that activating a third intestinal hormone in principle could have a more effective influence on the appetite and satisfaction of a person, which leads to a stronger weight loss and additional health advantages.
This is exactly what UBT251 does because it aims to GLP-1, GIP and another intestinal hormone called Glucagon.
“The addition of a candidate that aims at Glucagon as well as GLP-1 and GIP will give our clinical pipeline important optionality, since we want to develop a wide portfolio of differentiated treatment options that live up to the different needs of people who live with these very widespread diseases,” said Martin Holst Lange, Executive Vice President for the development of Novordisk, said on Monday.
Eli Lilly has the following to do with all of this.
The newly acquired drug from Novo Nordisk is a clear potential competitor of Eli Lilly's so -called “Triple G” family medication retatrutide.
The experimental injection aims at the same intestinal hormones as UBT251 and showed even greater weight loss in studies with medium level than Eli Lillys.
Retatrutid helped the patient to lose 24.2% of their body weight or £ 58 after £ 48 in a study with a medium level with obese or overweight adults. Those who took the placebo lost 2.1% of their body weight after the same time.
Eli Lilly expected to results from a 68-week study in the late stage of people with obesity and osteoarthritis of the knee in 2025 to publish at least nine closely respected clinical studies with retatrutide.
This means that Eli Lilly's medication could enter the market years before the treatment of Novo Nordisk.
Nevertheless, Seigerman found that the data from UBT251 from a phase -1 study in China on 36 patients are “impressive”.
The highest dose of the weekly injection helped the patient to lose an average of 15.1% of their weight after 12 weeks, compared to an average weight loss of 1.5% in patients who have taken a placebo, according to Novo Nordisks publication.
The security data of the medicine agreed with other intestinal hormone stargeting therapies. The most common side effects were gastrointestinal and the majority were easy to moderate.
“While the results are early, we see these signs of effectiveness as promising and potentially competitive,” said Seigerman.
He added that the new deal could reproduce the efforts of Novo Nordisk to reproduce according to undermining data on his other experimental obstacle medicine called Cagrisema. It is a combination of cagrilintide – an emerging form of weight loss treatment, which is known as amylin analogue – and Semaglutid, the active ingredient in paths and ozempic.
Feel free to send Annikakim.constantino@nbcuni.com tips, suggestions, ideas and data to Annika.
Latest in the healthcare system Tech: Doctors see the advantages of AI, but feel pessimistic about the future of the US health system
Things are looking for doctors in the USA – at least a little.
According to a new survey, which was commissioned by the provider of Health Care software, Athenaheald, doctors generally feel better with regard to their profession than in previous years. The number of doctors who thought about leaving the profession weekly decreased by 22% compared to the previous year.
At least this is because artificial intelligence has contributed to alleviating some of their administrative responsibilities, the survey says. Only around 27% of doctors believe that the AI is exceeded compared to 40% of those surveyed last year.
Nevertheless, most doctors still have broader concerns. Only about 30% of the respondents stated that the general direction of the US health system was optimistic.
Athenaheald has teamed up with the Harris survey to carry out the survey called doctor Sentiment Survey. Between January 2 and January 15, 750 general practitioners and 251 specialists in the USA were interviewed. Only 6% of the respondents use the electronic software for electrical health files from Athenaheald.
Perhaps not surprisingly, that around half of the doctors who are already using AI in their practices indicate that transcription services and skills are currently the most valuable application for technology. KI tools that can automatically generate documentation such as clinical notes are increasingly popular last year.
But doctors are still not fully sold on AI.
More than 60% of the respondents stated that they are concerned that the technology could lead to loss of human touch. Similarly, 58% of the doctors surveyed stated that they were concerned about the dependence on AI for diagnoses, and 53% stated that they were concerned about the risk of improper diagnosis.
Doctors are also concerned about the demanding official requirements, the lack of data exchange between systems and the financial health of their organizations. And while 61% of the respondents believe that patient portals help improve the quality of care, 83% of the doctors surveyed stated that they expanded their administrative workload.
So small steps to progress? The survey suggests that KI contributed to improving the mood of the doctors last year, but it was not a silver ball.
If Ai continue to mature, we will watch closely to determine where it is and what is not a real difference in health care.
Read more about the survey results here.
Feel free to send tips, suggestions, story ideas and data to Ashley at Ashley.capoot@nbcuni.com.
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