Novo Nordisk is pulling the plug on its partnership with Hims & Hers Health over claims that the telehealth company sold fake versions of the pharmaceutical firm’s weight-loss drug, Wegovy.
The Danish drugmaker said Monday that Wegovy will no longer be available on Hims & Hers and that it is ending the collaboration because the San Francisco-based online health company sold “illegitimate, knockoff versions of Wegovy that put patient safety at risk.”
Novo Nordisk’s move to dissolve the partnership came less than two months after the companies said they were entering a “long-term collaboration” to make obesity treatment more accessible.
Shares of Hims & Hers plunged more than $20, or roughly 31%, to $44.10 following Novo Nordisk’s announcement.
Hims & Hers did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The company had expected to make more than $700 million this year on weight-loss services, a target that could be difficult to reach without Wegovy sales.
Novo Nordisk said it began selling Wegovy via telehealth companies, including Hims & Hers, after a nationwide shortage. In offering the drug through more retailers, Novo Nordisk said it wanted to shift patients from using “knock-off, compounded versions” of Wegovy to the Food and Drug Administration-approved semaglutide drug.
This followed an order from the FDA that sought to restrict compounding pharmacies from selling copycat weight-loss drugs, a move that’s expected to drive up prices.
“After over one month into the collaboration, Hims & Hers Health, Inc. has failed to adhere to the law which prohibits mass sales of compounded drugs under the false guise of ‘personalization’ and are disseminating deceptive marketing that put patient safety at risk,” a Novo Nordisk spokesperson told CBS MoneyWatch. “This is unacceptable, and that is why we have decided to end the collaboration.”
The FDA approved Wegovy for adults with obesity in March 2024, adding it to an expanding market of weight-loss drugs that include Ozempic and Mounjaro. Demand for GLP-1 drugs, which are used to treat diabetes and weight loss, has surged in recent years, with one in eight U.S. adults saying they’ve used the treatments, according to health research publisher KFF.
In its release, Novo Nordisk said a company investigation showed that the ingredients in knock-off drugs sold by telehealth entities and compounding pharmacies are manufactured by foreign suppliers in China and that a large share of the drugs were never inspected by the FDA.
“U.S. patients should not be exposed to knock-off drugs made with unsafe and illicit foreign ingredients,” Novo Nordisk said.
Novo Nordisk will continue to sell Wegovy on other telehealth platforms that “share our commitment to patient safety,” said Dave Moore, executive vice president at Novo Nordisk, in the company’s statement. Among the telehealth companies Novo Nordisk partners with are LifeMD and Ro.
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