Lilly to offer highest doses of weight-loss drug Zepbound on website

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(Reuters) -Eli Lilly will ship the two highest doses of its popular weight-loss drug Zepbound to cash-paying customers on its website starting early August, the U.S. drugmaker said on Monday.

With the addition of the 12.5 milligrams and 15 mg doses, all approved doses of Zepbound will be available on the website in single-dose vials for $499 per month or less, regardless of insurance status, the company said.

Doctors can begin prescribing the higher-dose vials on July 7.

Lilly and rival Novo Nordisk started offering vials at discounted prices on their respective websites to expand access and stave off competition from compounded versions or cheaper copies of their weight-loss drugs.

The LillyDirect website was launched last year to help patients directly order some drugs.

In February, the U.S. drugmaker reduced the price of Zepbound vials and expanded the range of doses for patients who choose to pay cash through the drugmaker’s direct-to-consumer website.

In May, CVS Health said it had decided to drop Zepbound from some lists of medicines it covers for reimbursement from July 1, but would keep reimbursing for Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy after negotiating a more favorable price from the Danish drugmaker.

Both Lilly and Novo have been competing in the potential $150 billion obesity drug market. However, recent prescription data shared by analysts indicates Lilly has taken the lead, overtaking Novo despite its initial first-mover advantage.

Compounding pharmacies had been allowed to produce hundreds of thousands of doses of their versions when the branded drugs were in shortage. However, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has since banned sales of the copies.

The companies have also been offering the drugs on several telehealth platforms.

(Reporting by Bhanvi Satija and Sriparna Roy in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber and Devika Syamnath)