Cost of Popular Weight Loss Drugs Goes Down for People Without Insurance

The makers of Wegovy and Zepbound have lowered the price for people paying out of pocket for the popular GLP-1 weight loss drugs.

Novo Nordisk (the maker of Wegovy) and Eli Lilly (the maker of Zepbound) have both decreased the price of these weight loss drugs for people who are paying out of pocket or do not have insurance coverage for weight loss drugs. Doses of both Wegovy and Zepbound can be purchased directly from the pharmaceutical companies at $499 a month, with Zepbound’s starter dose of 2.5 mg costing $349 a month.  

“In reality, cost is a major consideration for these weight loss medications,” says Alyssa Dominguez, MD, an endocrinologist at Keck Medicine of USC. “They’re very expensive out of pocket, so when I’m seeing a patient, one of the first things we look at is insurance coverage. If an insurance plan doesn’t cover Wegovy or Zepbound, these out-of-pocket programs with Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly can be a way for patients to still access these drugs.” 

In the last few years, both drugs had been in short supply due to manufacturing issues and high demand. However, the makers of these drugs have caught up to the demand, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently ruled the shortage for both Wegovy and Zepbound to be over. For patients, this means that some “copycat” versions of these drugs, which were allowed to be sold from telehealth providers during the shortage, will soon be restricted, leaving these patients looking for alternative prescriptions. 

If getting a prescription is an issue, endocrinologists at Keck Medicine of USC, including Dr. Dominguez, often see patients via telehealth. Patients can establish care, get new prescriptions and get treatment for complications they might have from starting a new drug or a higher dose of a drug. A standard starting dose for Zepbound is 2.5 mg, Dr. Dominguez says, and as patients get used to the drug, your prescribing doctor will usually increase the dosage to 5-15 mg. 

“Telehealth expands access to care,” she says. “I have some patients who are seeing me from locations where it would have taken them hours to drive in for a clinic visit. It helps that they don’t have to come all the way in for an office visit if they are having side effects and need my guidance or help with navigating nausea or other complications.”  

It’s important to work with your primary care doctor or an endocrinologist when starting these GLP-1 agonist medications, Dr. Dominguez says. They can help you decide which medicine is best for you and help you navigate prescriptions and insurance coverage. 

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