Germany is considering an export ban on Novo Nordisk A/S’s blockbuster weight-loss drugs as European countries try to protect supplies amid a global shortage.
The craze around two Novo drugs that can help people shed about 15% of their weight is causing scarcity for the original patients they were intended for: people with diabetes.
Some supplies of the drugs, which are cheaper in Germany than elsewhere, get sent to other European countries and to the US, Karl Broich, president of the German Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices, said in an interview with Der Spiegel magazine.
Broich’s agency is talking with politicians about instituting an export ban if current efforts, including raising awareness of the supply constraints, fail to work.
“We need the drug for the care of diabetes patients and not as a lifestyle drug,” Broich told Spiegel. “You can see that things are being advertised on social media that are not at all in our interest.”
Germany isn’t the only European Union country considering rarely used regulatory mechanisms to help shore up supplies of the medicine. Belgium earlier this week tightened rules around prescribing Ozempic and other similar drugs, reserving them for diabetes and people with certain types of obesity.
Amid the craze, both US and European regulators are also cracking down on illegal sales of the drugs and investigating counterfeit versions that can be harmful to people’s health.
Eli Lilly & Co. won US regulatory clearance for a similar medicine for weight loss last week. Broich noted that the arrival of competing products should help with supply issues.
--With assistance from Naomi Kresge.
