Reuters Health News Summary

The new drug is part of the second generation of weight-loss pills under development by companies including Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk that will offer patients a more convenient alternative to injections. US FTC to sue drug middlemen over insulin prices, source says The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is planning to sue UnitedHealth, Cigna and CVS Health over their tactics as middlemen in negotiating prices for drugs including insulin, a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.

Following is a summary of current health news briefs.

Most patients stop using Wegovy, Ozempic for weight loss within two years, analysis finds

Only one in four U.S. patients prescribed Novo Nordisk's Wegovy or Ozempic for weight loss were still taking the popular medications two years later, according to an analysis of U.S. pharmacy claims provided to Reuters that also showed a steady decline in use over time. The analysis does not include details about why patients quit. But it does offer a longer view on the real-world experiences of patients taking the drugs than previous research that studied use over a year or less.

Bird flu response in Michigan sparks COVID-era worry on farms

Some dairy farmers are resisting Michigan's nation-leading efforts to stop the spread of bird flu for fear their incomes will suffer from added costs and hurt rural America. The government's restrictions, which include tracking who comes and goes from farms, are rekindling unwanted memories of COVID-19 in Martin and other small towns in central Michigan.

US Senator Sanders optimistic Novo Nordisk can be pressured to cut Wegovy, Ozempic prices

Senator Bernie Sanders on Wednesday expressed confidence that Novo Nordisk can be convinced to cut the U.S. prices of its popular Ozempic and Wegovy drugs used for weight loss by publicly shaming the company over how much it charges compared with prices in other countries. Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Jorgensen is set to testify before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP), which Sanders chairs, in a September hearing focusing on U.S. prices for Ozempic and Wegovy.

Gerresheimer's weight-loss drug deals pipeline helps profits meet forecasts

Medical equipment group Gerresheimer posted second-quarter adjusted core profit in line with expectations on Thursday, driven by the deal pipeline for its plastics and devices business, which supplies weight-loss drug makers with autoinjector pens. The company confirmed guidance for the mid-term that its deals with weight-loss drug manufacturers, such as Novo Nordisk, are expected to bring at least 350 million euros ($379.44 million) of annual revenue over the next three years, despite lower demand in its primary packaging glass division.

Pfizer moves forward with once-daily weight-loss pill

Pfizer plans to move a reworked, once-a-day version of its weight-loss pill danuglipron into clinical trials later this year, the company said on Thursday, after scrapping a twice- daily version of the drug late last year. The new drug is part of the second generation of weight-loss pills under development by companies including Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk that will offer patients a more convenient alternative to injections.

US FTC to sue drug middlemen over insulin prices, source says

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is planning to sue UnitedHealth, Cigna and CVS Health over their tactics as middlemen in negotiating prices for drugs including insulin, a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday. The three companies own the largest pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, which are being investigated for the rebates, or volume-based discounts, they negotiate with drug manufacturers, and how these influence drug access and pricing.

Musk's Neuralink says tiny wires of brain chip in first patient now stable

The tiny wires of Neuralink's brain chip implant used in the first participant in a trial run by Elon Musk's company have become "more or less very stable", a company executive said on Wednesday. The company had in May said that a number of tiny wires inside the brain of Noland Arbaugh, who is paralyzed from the shoulders down due to a 2016 diving accident, had pulled out of position.

Former CEO of SCWorx Corp convicted of securities fraud over COVID tests

The former CEO of healthcare software company SCWorx Corp was found guilty of investor fraud for falsely stating the company was becoming a major supplier of COVID-19 rapid tests early in the pandemic, the U.S. Justice Department said on Wednesday. The Justice Department said in a statement that a federal jury in New Jersey convicted Marc Schessel, 64, of two counts of securities fraud for public statements by SCWorx in April 2020, early in the pandemic, claiming that it was buying and reselling at least 48 million COVID-19 test kits, despite knowing that the statements were false. SCWorx said it had a binding contract to acquire the rapid COVID test kits from an Australian supplier.

Backers of Arizona abortion rights amendment sue over language in voter pamphlet

Supporters of a ballot measure that would amend Arizona's constitution to establish a right to abortion sued Republican lawmakers on Wednesday over language in a pamphlet to be distributed to voters before they go to the polls in November, saying the document's use of the phrase "unborn human" is not neutral. Arizona for Abortion Access, the group behind the ballot measure, in its lawsuit asked the Maricopa County Superior Court for an order requiring the Arizona Legislative Council, a committee of lawmakers overseeing the pamphlet, to adopt "impartial" language. The group said "fetus" would be "a neutral, objective, and medically accurate term uniformly used by medical professionals and government agencies."

US FDA declines to approve Novo Nordisk's weekly insulin

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has declined to approve Novo Nordisk's weekly insulin in patients with diabetes, the Danish drugmaker said on Wednesday. The health regulator in its so-called "complete response letter" sought more information related to the manufacturing process and the type 1 diabetes indication to complete the review, Novo said.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)