In case you missed it, the Big Pharma manufacturers of blockbuster brand name
GLP-1 drugs for diabetes and weight loss, Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk, recently
reported first quarter earnings, with each company reporting strong earnings
that beat Wall Street analysts’ expectations after hiking prices on products in
their portfolios earlier this year.





 

May 9, 2025



TOPLINE



In case you missed it, the Big Pharma manufacturers of blockbuster brand name
GLP-1 drugs for diabetes and weight loss, Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk, recently
reported first quarter earnings, with each company reporting strong earnings
that beat Wall Street analysts’ expectations after hiking prices on products in
their portfolios earlier this year.



During the Eli Lilly earnings call, an analyst at Jefferies asked a question
regarding the company’s pricing approach to GLP-1s. In response, Lucas
Montarce, Chief Financial Officer at Eli Lilly, said he believes the price
impressions are consistent with the trends that Eli Lilly has seen in the last
twelve months. The pharmaceutical company consistently hikes the prices of its
blockbuster drugs, including their GLP-1 drug portfolio. This year alone, Eli
Lilly hiked prices on 11 prescription drugs, including their GLP-1 drug
Zepbound, by 2.5 percent.



During the Novo Nordisk earnings call, an analyst from Bank of America posed a
question about changes to expect on the drug company’s Ozempic marketing
strategy, to which Novo Nordisk’s President and Executive Vice President of
U.S. operations, Dave Moore, responded the company’s commercial focus for the
blockbuster GLP-1 will be to double down on big spending on direct-to-consumer
(DTC) advertising pushing sales of the high-priced blockbuster, including
through a new campaign titled the “Ozempic Era.”



Novo Nordisk spent $208 million on DTC advertising promoting Ozempic in 2023
alone. Big Pharma’s staggering spending on advertising directly targeting
consumers, like Novo Nordisk’s marketing of Ozempic, often walks hand-in-hand
with price hikes on these blockbuster products, increases sales of high-priced
drugs, and costs U.S. taxpayers billions of dollars.



Read more on Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk’s earnings, fueled by price hikes and
anti-competitive tactics,HERE
<[link removed]> and HERE
<[link removed]>.



QUOTE OF THE WEEK



“PhRMA lobbyists and industry loyalists are about to start tweeting how Merck
is ‘innovating’ Keytruda for patients. If you want to know the real reason
they’re product hopping Keytruda just listen to what Merck’s CEO and analysts
tell investors.”



- Tahir Amin, CEO, Initiative for Medicine, Access and Knowledge (I-MAK)
<[link removed]>





DATA POINTS YOU SHOULD KNOW



$233.6 Million



The overall TV ad spend across the top 10 drug brands in April 2025, according
to an article byFierce Pharma
<[link removed]>
.



TWEETS OF THE WEEK



@IMAKglobal <[link removed]>: “Our new
brief exposes how Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk’s financialized business model
relies on abusing the patent system to monopolize the GLP-1 drug market.
[link removed] <[link removed]>”



@ScottAdamsShow <[link removed]>:
“The United States is 1 of 2 countries in the world that allow pharmaceutical
companies to advertise directly to customers. @RobertKennedyJr describes the
ramifications of these gargantuan marketing budgets on our public health.”



ROAD TO RECOVERY



Bloomberg Government: GOP Eyes Pharma Tax Hike, Nixing Drug Price Deal for
Trump Bill
<[link removed]>



Lawmakers have separately discussed eliminating a tax deduction for
pharmaceutical advertising, Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-Fla.), chairman of the Ways
and Means Health Subcommittee, said Thursday. It’s unclear whether that
provision will be in the final tax cut package. Pharmaceutical ads have come
under special scrutiny as most other countries don’t allow drugmakers to run
television ads, and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
has called to ban the television ads entirely.



News Nation: Trump Is ‘Deeply Committed’ To Lowering Drug Prices: FDA
Commissioner
<[link removed]>



FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary joins “Elizabeth Vargas Reports” to discuss
whether Trump can effectively lower drug prices.



PHARMA’S POOR PROGNOSIS



MM+M: Big Pharma’s Reputation Declines For Second Year In A Row
<[link removed]>



The pharma industry’s reputation has continued to slide — and it’s mostly due
to the persistent issue of high drug costs, according to a report released by
research firm PatientView this week. Fifty-six percent of the surveyed patient
groups said the industry had an “excellent” or “good” reputation last year, a
drop from 57% the year prior and 60% in 2021. PatientView surveyed more than
2,500 patient groups worldwide for its annual “Corporate Reputation of Pharma”
report. This year, it examined the reputations of 46 Big Pharma companies —
including the likes of AbbVie, AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly and Johnson & Johnson.



ProPublica: Why Do Americans Pay More For Prescription Drugs?
<[link removed]>



In the U.S., the price of Revlimid, a brand-name cancer drug, has been
increasing for two decades. It now sells for nearly $1,000 a pill. In Europe,
the price has been consistently lower — in some countries by two-thirds. I
started reporting on Revlimid after I was prescribed the drug following a
diagnosis of multiple myeloma, an incurable blood cancer. Stunned by the high
price, I found that the drugmaker, Celgene, had used Revlimid as its own
personal piggy bank for more than a decade, raising the price in the U.S.
whenever it saw fit. Even with lower prices in Europe, Celgene still made a
profit there, a former executive told Congress. That added to the more than $21
billion in net earnings the company made after Revlimid was introduced in 2005.



###



























Copyright © 2019 Campaign for Sustainable Rx Pricing
Our address is 1341 G St NW, #1100, Washington, DC xxxxxx


This email was sent to [email protected]. To unsubscribe please click
here.
<[link removed]>