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Reader Question - What is Going On With Medicare and GLP-1 Diet Drugs?

Weight and Healthcare 

Reader Question What is Going On With Medicare and GLP-1 Diet Drugs? This is the Weight and Healthcare Newsletter. If you like what you're hearing, please consider subscribing or sharing at weightandhealthcare.com. I've received a bunch of reader questions that can be summarized as, what the hell is going on with GLP-1s in Medicare?

If you don't live in the U.S., or if you do and you don't know about Medicare, it is our state-run insurance program for which only people over 65 and some disabled people qualify. And in the piece on weight and healthcare, I have a link that has a full explanation of eligibility. After the Fen-Fen tragedy harmed and killed so many people, Medicare stopped covering weight loss drugs.

Novo Nordisk, Eli Lilly, and the various AstroTurf organizations that represent their interests have been working overtime to try to get Medicare to cover their drugs. They have been working hard to get the drugs approved at the weight loss dose for uses other than weight loss in order to exploit a Medicare loophole that allows for weight loss drugs to be prescribed if they are FDA approved for other uses. Starting July 1st, the government is announcing what they are calling the Medicare-GLP-1 Bridge.

The bridge will be in effect from July 1st, 2026 through December 31st, 2027. The goal of the program is a demonstration, quote, to determine whether changes in methods of payment or reimbursement under Medicare would have the effect of increasing the efficiency and economy of health services covered under Medicare through the creation of additional incentives to these ends.

Reader Question - What is Going On With Medicare and GLP-1 Diet Drugs?

Read the full transcript

The candid version is on a podcast,
not the earnings call.

Reader Question - What is Going On With Medicare and GLP-1 Diet Drugs?

Read the full transcript

The candid version is on a podcast, not the earnings call.

The candid version is on a podcast,
not the earnings call.