Hacker News with Generative AI: Pharmaceuticals

Ozempic and Wegovy are selected for Medicare's price negotiations (apnews.com)
Popular weight loss and diabetes drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy have been added to Medicare’s list of medications that will be negotiated directly between the government and drug manufacturers, the Biden administration said Friday.

Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals, Government, Medicare

188 points by geox 11 days ago | 328 comments

Ask HN: Why do some medicines come as pills and others as capsules? (ycombinator.com)
Ask HN: Why do some medicines come as pills and others as capsules?

Pharmaceuticals, Medicine, Health, Science

9 points by litoE 29 days ago | 8 comments

Pfizer Stopped Us from Getting Ozempic Decades Ago (nytimes.com)
They called 2023 the year of Ozempic, but it now seems GLP-1 drugs might define an entire decade — or an even longer era.

Pharmaceuticals, Health, Obesity, Medical Research

15 points by bko 32 days ago | 2 comments

McKinsey and Company to pay $650M for role in opioid crisis (npr.org)
The global consulting firm McKinsey and Company Friday agreed to pay $650 million to settle a federal probe into its role in helping "turbocharge" sales of the highly addictive opioid painkiller OxyContin for Purdue Pharma, the U.S. Justice Department announced on Friday.

Business, Law, Opioid Crisis, Pharmaceuticals

390 points by pseudolus 45 days ago | 303 comments

The benefits of Ozempic and its kin may extend far beyond weight loss (sciencenews.org)
This year, the popularity of the diabetes and weight-loss drug semaglutide has continued to surge. You’ve probably seen ads on social media or heard from friends who’ve tried top-selling brand-name versions, Ozempic and the higher-dose variety Wegovy (SN: 6/29/24, p. 5), or read accounts of people microdosing these drugs.

Medicine, Weight Loss, Health, Pharmaceuticals

5 points by sohkamyung 46 days ago | 0 comments

Weight loss drugs may also treat addiction, Alzheimer's, and heart disease (arstechnica.com)
Pharmaceutical companies are already cashing in on their other health benefits.

Pharmaceuticals, Health, Weight Loss, Addiction, Alzheimer's

12 points by thehoff 46 days ago | 1 comments

Why Recursion Pharmaceuticals abandoned cell painting for brightfield imaging (owlposting.com)
At this point, you’d be hard pressed to not have heard of Recursion Pharmaceuticals.

Pharmaceuticals, BioTech, Science, Imaging

66 points by abhishaike 46 days ago | 11 comments

Ozempic Killed Diet and Exercise (theatlantic.com)
Doctors might be slow to admit it, but Ozempic and other GLP-1 drugs are making dieting and exercise obsolete.

Health, Pharmaceuticals, Diet, Exercise

7 points by bookofjoe 49 days ago | 6 comments

FDA Heads to Court to Defend Decision Protecting Drug Monopoly from Competition (hntrbrk.com)
In October, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the latest maneuver from United Therapeutics Corp. to block a new lung disease treatment from being offered to patients by rival Liquidia Technologies.

Pharmaceuticals, Law, Business, Competition

8 points by impish9208 53 days ago | 0 comments

CVS, UnitedHealth, Cigna sue to block FTC case over insulin prices (cnbc.com)

Healthcare, Lawsuits, Pharmaceuticals, Insurance

7 points by croes 54 days ago | 0 comments

Novo Nordisk sells hit weight-loss drug in China–at fraction of US price (arstechnica.com)
Patients in China will be able to purchase the blockbuster weight-loss drug Wegovy for 1,400 yuan, or about $193, just a fraction of the US list price of $1,349, according to media reports.

Pharmaceuticals, China, Business, Healthcare, Pricing

5 points by belter 69 days ago | 0 comments

Why do hospitals keep running out of generic drugs? (npr.org)
There's something strange going on in hospitals. Cheap, common drugs that nurses use every day seem to be constantly hit by shortages. These are often generic drugs that don't seem super complicated to make, things like dextrose and saline (aka sugar water and salt water).

Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals

13 points by idamantium 80 days ago | 1 comments

After decades, FDA moves to pull ineffective decongestant off shelves (arstechnica.com)
In a long-sought move, the Food and Drug Administration on Thursday formally began the process of abandoning oral doses of a common over-the-counter decongestant, which the agency concluded last year is not effective at relieving stuffy noses.

Health, FDA, Pharmaceuticals, Over-the-Counter Medications

299 points by coloneltcb 81 days ago | 3 comments

FDA proposes ending use of oral phenylephrine as OTC nasal decongestant (fda.gov)
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced it is proposing to remove oral phenylephrine as an active ingredient that can be used in over-the-counter (OTC) monograph drug products for the temporary relief of nasal congestion after an agency review of the available data determined that oral phenylephrine is not effective for this use.

FDA, Pharmaceuticals, Health, Regulations, Nasal Congestion

303 points by impish9208 81 days ago | 508 comments

A new stronger Ozempic is coming. Here's what to know (qz.com)
Novo Nordisk (NVO-4.34%) teased some new details about a potential Ozempic successor during a call with investors Tuesday.

Pharmaceuticals, Health, Diabetes, Weight Loss, Business

16 points by toomuchtodo 82 days ago | 3 comments

Drugmaker shut down after black schmutz found in injectable weight-loss drug (arstechnica.com)
The Food and Drug Administration is warning consumers not to use any drugs made by a compounding pharmacy in California after regulators realized the pharmacy was making drugs that need to be sterile—particularly injectable drugs—without using sterile ingredients or any sterilization steps.

Pharmaceuticals, Health, Regulation, Safety

17 points by LinuxBender 83 days ago | 5 comments

The Prozac Era. What Next? (davidhealy.org)
In 1963, Hoffman la Roche launched Valium, the brand name for diazepam, a benzodiazepine. It followed hot on the heels of Librium – chlordiazepoxide – another benzodiazepine. This was like one company producing 2 SSRIs and able to get them to numbers 1 and 2 in the charts.

Mental Health, Pharmaceuticals, History

12 points by cen4 86 days ago | 4 comments

Antibody Drug Conjugates: A frontier in cancer treatment (sagelyhealth.com)
An exciting frontier in cancer treatment over 100 years in the making.

Cancer, Medical Research, Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology, Treatment

107 points by peerless-app 88 days ago | 44 comments

GLP-1s are among the most important drug breakthroughs (economist.com)
IN THE HISTORY of medicine, a few drugs tower above all others. Humira for rheumatoid arthritis; Prozac for depression; statins to prevent heart disease and strokes. All have helped patients far beyond doctors’ initial expectations and continue to benefit millions of people every day. A new class of drugs is set to join their ranks and has the potential to eclipse them all—GLP-1 receptor agonists.

Pharmaceuticals, Medicine, Health, Science, Drugs

58 points by car 90 days ago | 147 comments

Weight-loss surgery down 25 percent as anti-obesity drug use soars (news.harvard.edu)
A new study examining a large sample of privately insured patients with obesity found that use of drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy as anti-obesity medications more than doubled from 2022 to 2023.

Obesity, Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals, Weight Loss

11 points by paulpauper 90 days ago | 1 comments

New study finds obesity operations dropped 25.6% in 2023 due to GLP-1 drugs (statnews.com)
For people with obesity, surgeries that shrink, reshape, or otherwise alter the anatomy of the stomach have long reigned supreme as the surest way to weight loss. But in the last few years, with the approval of GLP-1 drugs like Wegovy and Zepbound, more and more people are opting for obesity medicines over gold-standard surgical treatments.

Obesity, Healthcare, Medicine, Pharmaceuticals, Weight Loss

6 points by ck2 92 days ago | 3 comments

It's not just obesity. Drugs like Ozempic will change the world (economist.com)
Every day seems to bring more exciting news. First the drugs tackled diabetes. Then, with just an injection a week, they took on obesity. Now they are being found to treat cardiovascular and kidney disease, and are being tested for Alzheimer’s and addiction. It is early days yet, but glp-1 receptor agonists have all the makings of one of the most successful classes of drugs in history.

Health, Pharmaceuticals, Obesity, Medicine

32 points by Anon84 94 days ago | 167 comments

Ozempic linked to lower Alzheimer's risk in people with Type 2 diabetes (nbcnews.com)
Semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy, appeared to reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease in people with Type 2 diabetes, according to a study published Thursday in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia.

Health, Alzheimer's Disease, Pharmaceuticals

98 points by benchtobedside 95 days ago | 204 comments

The Maker of Ozempic Is Trying to Block Compounded Versions of Its Drug (wired.com)
Drugmaker Novo Nordisk is taking action to curb the massively popular compounded semaglutide industry, which provides copies of its blockbuster weight-loss drugs Ozempic and Wegovy to patients—often for much lower prices.

Pharmaceuticals, Healthcare, Business, Competition

103 points by impish9208 97 days ago | 153 comments

Growing Cannabis and Opium Poppies May Be Key to U.S. Supply Chains (nytimes.com)
After supply chain disruptions that made critical medicines scarce, a federal effort is underway to ensure domestic stocks of pharmaceutical ingredients.

Pharmaceuticals, Supply Chain, Cannabis, Opium

4 points by bookofjoe 101 days ago | 1 comments

India's copycat drugmakers gear up to offer cheaper weight-loss drugs (ft.com)
India’s copycat drugmakers gear up to offer cheaper weight-loss drugs

Pharmaceuticals, India, Healthcare, Weight Loss

8 points by JumpCrisscross 107 days ago | 1 comments

Psilocybin bests SSRI for major depression in first long-term comparison (medscape.com)

Psilocybin, Depression, Mental Health, Pharmaceuticals, Clinical Trials

582 points by Thomvis 108 days ago | 379 comments

How long til we're all on Ozempic? (asteriskmag.com)
Over 100 million Americans, and possibly many more, could benefit from GLP-1 drugs. When can they expect to get them?

Health, Pharmaceuticals, Obesity, Medicine

461 points by thehoff 108 days ago | 1584 comments

GLP-1 pills are coming, and they could revolutionize weight-loss treatment (cnn.com)