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For the pharmaceutical industry, obesity is a billion-dollar business. The essential facts about the market at a glance.
The market: Around two billion adults are overweight, of which around 650 million are obese (people with a body mass index BMI of 30 or more). Obesity is one of the biggest health problems. In America, almost half of the population is obese. In Switzerland, 42 percent of adults are overweight, eleven percent of whom are obese.
In 2015, an estimated four million people died as a result of being overweight. The causes of death were cardiovascular disease, diabetes or kidney disease. Around ten percent of global health costs are caused by obesity.
According to Morgan Stanley estimates, seven percent of Americans will be taking diet medications by 2035. From the perspective of the pharmaceutical industry, these are paying customers. Analysts estimate the potential for weight loss drugs to be around $100 billion by 2030.
The leading companies: The Danish Novo Nordisk is one of the leading manufacturers. The group is now the most valuable company in Europe on the stock exchange and is more important than the Swiss Nestlé or the pharmaceutical companies Roche and Novartis.
In the weight loss medication market, the American Eli Lilly is also trying to keep up with the diabetes drug Mounjaro and possible expansions. Merck and Pfizer are also playing. But there are also setbacks: Pfizer recently stopped studies on its promising active ingredient danuglipron. Half of the test subjects complained about severe side effects such as nausea and vomiting.
The most famous products: The leading manufacturer Novo Nordisk is on the market with the drugs Saxenda, Ozempic and Wegovy. However, Ozempic is a diabetes medication that can also be prescribed against obesity in exceptional cases. However, many diabetics are both overweight and diabetic.
Saxenda (active ingredient liraglutide) is a weight loss medication that has been on the market for a long time. It must be injected daily and is considered less effective than the newer Wegovy. The newer product Wegovy contains semaglutide, the same active ingredient as Ozempic, but in a higher dosage. It only needs to be injected weekly and is considered more effective.
The Swiss companies: Roche has bought Carmot, a US biotech company that researches anti-obesity drugs, for around $3 billion. However, there are no products on the market yet.
Experts see potential in connection with existing therapies against muscle diseases, because obesity patients often lose muscle mass instead of weight as a side effect. A combination of drugs from both areas could bring benefits for obesity patients. This could allow Roche to re-enter the market. The Japanese Roche subsidiary Chugai sold the rights to a potential weight loss ingredient to the American company Eli Lilly in 2018.
Roche also offered a diet pill called Xenical at the end of the 1990s. But the fat blocker was nowhere near as effective as the new injections. Patients also complained of diarrhea. Xenical was later exempted from prescription requirements. The patent protection has now expired. Roche no longer sells the tablet.