The chief executive officer of the pharmaceutical company that makes Ozempic appeared before the United States Senate to answer questions about the cost of weight loss drugs.
Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Fruergaard Jorgensen said the high prices were determined by insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers – not by drug makers. He testified before the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee.
“It’s a very complex market, very complex healthcare system that creates a lot of misunderstanding,’ said Jorgensen on Tuesday. In addition to Ozempic, his company produces Wegovy. Ozempic and Wegovy are forms of semaglutide that are used to treat diabetes and obesity.
Novo Nordisk has made roughly $50 billion from Wegovy and Ozempic in the last six years.
Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont pushed the executive to explain why Novo Nordisk “charges the American people the highest prices in the world for its lifesaving drugs.” His office noted that epidemiologists estimate that, if weight-loss drugs were more affordable, over 40,000 deaths could be prevented annually.
During his opening remarks, Sanders pointed out that Ozempic is sold in Germany for $59, in France for $71, in Denmark for $122, and in Canada dor $155. In contrast, the drug costs $969 in the United States.
Similarly, Wegovy costs $92 in the United Kingdom, $137 in Germany, $186 in Denmark, and $265 in Canada but $1,349 in the United States.
“What we are dealing with today, is not just an issue of economics, it is not just an issue of corporate greed,” said Sanders. ‘It is a profound moral issue.”
Sanders continued:Let’s be clear. The outrageously high cost of Ozempic, Wegovy, and other prescription drugs is directly related to the broken, dysfunctional and cruel healthcare system in our country.
While the current system makes huge profits for large drug companies like Novo Nordisk, huge profits for insurance companies, and huge profits for PBM’s, it is failing the needs of ordinary Americans.
… The simple truth is that we pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs and that is a major factor in the healthcare crisis we are experiencing. How does that happen? What’s the connection?
Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas fixed the blame for high prescription drug costs on pharmacy benefit managers rather than Novo Nordisk. Prior to his election to the Senate, he graduated from medical school at the University of Kansas and worked as an OB/GYN for 25 years.
“Novo Nordisk is not the villain in this story – they’re a hero,” said Marshall in his remarks. “We should be here celebrating this miracle innovation that’s responding to this diabetic epidemic we have in this country.”
“We all agree on this committee across the Senate that the cost of health care is too much, and that prescription drugs are too high, especially the out-of-pocket expenses, but we need to figure out who the villain is,” he added. “Whatever the cost is, whichever number we want to use, Novo Nordisk keeps 24% of it, and the PBMs extract 74% – 26% and 74% – so really, the PBMs are making the bank here.”
