The end of compounded GLP-1 drugs leaves many patients in a ‘lose-lose’ position

Most will simply go to the gray&#x2F;black market.<p>A 2 year supply of Ozempic (Semaglutide) lyophilized in sterile vials is ~$120USD (300mg of Semaglutide, 2.4mg a week at max dose so 125 weeks) on the black&#x2F;gray market and that&#x27;s with at least 2 middlemen making a profit so realistically the cost might be closer to $70USD?. Anyone can pay to get it HPLC tested to confirm the quantity, purity, sterility etc not to mention people (bodybuilders) have been using gray market peptides for 10+years and you never hear any stories about something going wrong (Things go wrong with oil based steroids for bodybuilders commonly not peptides in BAC water).<p>Meanwhile that same ~$120USD 2 year supply of Ozempic is $8400 in Europe, $9600 in Canada and $24000 in the USA.

I suspect medical tourism is going to get a big boost from this. You can travel to someplace like Thailand or Taiwan and bring back a 90 day supply, and the savings covers your airfare with some leftovers. If you were going to take a vacation anyhow, it&#x27;s a win-win.

Become a compounded pharmacist yourself: get lyophilized powder of glp-1 drugs, bacteriostatic water, Leur Lock syringe with a needle, gloves and alcohol pads; make your own glp-1 compound in your home.

Why would FDA do that? Obesity is the biggest public health disaster in US. They should make it as cheap as ibuprofen.

This is certainly a problem, but there just isn&#x27;t much that many can do about the laws as they are written (and the whole incentives of the pharmaceutical industry as we know it).<p>That said, there is some hope on the horizon, some patent expirations have already happened (i.e. liraglutide which is less effective) and some are coming:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;glp1.guide&#x2F;content&#x2F;patent-expirations-for-glp1-receptor-agonists&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;glp1.guide&#x2F;content&#x2F;patent-expirations-for-glp1-recep...</a>

$350 a month is already almost as much as we pay in EU. It won&#x27;t get any cheaper than that. Compounded GLP-1 drugs were an intellectual property theft - and not against some evil megacorporation, but impacting a company that actually already saved millions of lives and has capacity to improve lives of billions of people so much more. It could have been probably justified for a short while because of shortages (a logic of &quot;as long as you are unable to satisfy our demand, we will copycat your product ourselves&quot; is cynical, but with some moral stretch, acceptable), but not anymore.

Compounded: 200 USD month; Lilly&#x2F;Novo Discounted: 350 USD month<p>Seems alright?

Radical idea:<p>Have the government step in and say, “if you want to sell your drugs in America, you can only sell them to me.”<p>Then the government hammers that price down as low as it can go, and buys in bulk. A small rider is added to everyone’s federal taxes - a few dollars at most - to pay for it all, and the drugs are provided for free with any prescription.<p>It’s called single-payer healthcare, and most any advanced country uses that method to turn a $2,000&#x2F;mo drug that the end user would pay either directly or through income-reducing insurance, into a $50&#x2F;mo drug that is paid indirectly through federal taxes at less than 1&#x2F;100 the cost.<p>But <i>nooooooo…</i> America can’t do this because “socialism is evil”.

I’m regularly shown ads on Instagram for a company called “Willow”, which openly markets itself as a source of GLP-1’s for people who don’t meet the medical criteria. “I just want to lose 15 pounds before my beach vacation!” That type of thing. I’m not that upset to see the compounded GLP-1 market reigned in a bit.

FYI, it&#x27;s &quot;lose&#x2F;lose.&quot;

Anyone have the full article? It&#x27;s paywalled with no easy bypass.