{"id":10470,"date":"2026-02-12T10:04:21","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T10:04:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/10470\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T10:04:21","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T10:04:21","slug":"novo-nordisk-ceo-sees-opportunity-for-15-million-new-patients-as-medicare-covers-obesity-drugs-hims-hers-health-nysehims-eli-lilly-and-co-nyselly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/10470\/","title":{"rendered":"Novo Nordisk CEO Sees Opportunity For 15 Million New Patients As Medicare Covers Obesity Drugs – Hims & Hers Health (NYSE:HIMS), Eli Lilly and Co (NYSE:LLY)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Novo Nordisk (NYSE:<\/a>NVO<\/a>) CEO Mike Doustdar said the company aims to reach about 15 million new patients when Medicare begins covering obesity treatments later this year. <\/p>\n

However, the CEO said that the Medicare coverage for obesity treatments is unlikely to expand quickly, noting that expecting rapid access would be unrealistic. Doustdar pointed to the slow uptake among commercially insured eligible patients as a sign that adoption will likely take time. <\/p>\n

He also said that the company is currently negotiating with the government to finalize the exact timing for the opening, including the specific month and week.<\/p>\n

GLP-1 Price Cuts, Medicare Expansion<\/p>\n

On the newly launched TrumpRx website, Wegovy pills are listed at $149, roughly an 89% discount to prevailing market prices, while Wegovy and Ozempic pens start at $199 each. Meanwhile, Eli Lilly’s Zepbound is priced from $299 per vial, reflecting an estimated 72% discount.<\/p>\n

The deals will also expand Medicare and Medicaid coverage for the treatments starting in mid-2026. Previous reports suggested that Medicare will begin covering approved injectable and oral GLP-1 obesity treatments for the first time, with patients required to pay a $50 copay.<\/p>\n

Novo Faces GLP-1 Pressure, As Lilly Surges<\/p>\n

On the other hand, Eli Lilly expects revenue<\/a> of $80\u2013$83 billion, surpassing Wall Street’s $77.62 billion forecast, with the midpoint implying 25% growth.<\/p>\n

When asked how Novo plans to narrow the gap, Doustdar said one approach is “to do better on the pill.”<\/p>\n

Benzinga’s Edge Rankings place Novo Nordisk in the 77th percentile for quality and the 31st percentile for value, reflecting its mixed performance. Benzinga\u2019s screener allows you to compare NVO\u2019s performance with its peers.<\/p>\n

Price Action:\u00a0Over the past year, Novo Nordisk stock declined 40.41%, as per data from\u00a0Benzinga Pro. On Wednesday, the stock fell 0.77% to close at $48.74.<\/p>\n

Disclaimer:\u00a0This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.<\/p>\n

Image via Shutterstock<\/p>\n

Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a9 2026 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n

To add Benzinga News as your preferred source on Google, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Novo Nordisk (NYSE:NVO) CEO Mike Doustdar said the company aims to reach about 15 million new patients when…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10471,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[271],"tags":[3967,8255,8256,2086,2089,2090,3968,2088,2084,272,352,2095,8257,2096],"class_list":{"0":"post-10470","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-novo-nordisk","8":"tag-category-equities","9":"tag-category-eurozone","10":"tag-category-fda","11":"tag-category-government","12":"tag-category-health-care","13":"tag-category-legal","14":"tag-category-markets","15":"tag-category-news","16":"tag-cms-wordpress","17":"tag-novo-nordisk","18":"tag-pageisbzpro-bz","19":"tag-symbol-hims","20":"tag-symbol-lly","21":"tag-symbol-nvo"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10470","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10470\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}