How one state is trying to make weight loss drugs cheaper
Weight loss drugs aren't covered by insurance for North Carolina's state employees. The state is negotiating with drugmakers Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk to try to lower the costs.
Dale Folwell says North Carolina is “under siege” by drugmakers Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly.
The North Carolina treasurer said the sky-high costs of popular weight loss drugs — Wegovy and Saxenda, from Novo Nordisk, and Zepbound, from Eli Lilly — have financially strained the state’s health insurance plan for its more than 750,000 teachers, state employees and retirees, forcing it to stop providing coverage for the drugs earlier this year.
According to the state treasurer’s office, last year, North Carolina paid for weight loss drugs for almost 25,000 state employees, costing it more than $100 million — about 10% of its total spending on prescription drugs and more than the plan spent on all cancer treatments combined.
The weight loss drugs were projected to cost North Carolina another $600 million-plus within the next five years. That ballooning expense prompted the state’s health plan board of trustees in January to vote to stop covering them on the state’s health care plan.
That’s not how Folwell wanted it to go.
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