U.S. taxpayers picked up the tab for about $6.2 billion worth of research, development and distribution of GLP-1s, the new class of blockbuster weight-loss drugs, according to an investigation by The Lever.
The “blockbuster drugs” generate annual sales exceeding $1 billion for Big Pharma.
Drugs like Ozempic, Wegovy and Zepbound — which belong to the glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) class of drugs — are “minting billions of dollars” for Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk, the companies that make them.
Taxpayers fund the research. Pharma reaps massive profits. And Americans pay up to 11 times more for the drugs than people in other countries. The marked-up prices are inflating insurance premiums and risk bankrupting the country’s healthcare system, according to The Lever.
Researchers at Bentley University shared data with The Lever showing that between 1980 and 2024, the federal government spent $6.2 billion on the discovery and development of GLP-1 molecules, plus research on how to use those molecules to treat diabetes, obesity and other health conditions.
“You have to know a lot to develop a drug and to apply it in people,” Dr. Fred Ledley, professor of Natural and Applied Sciences at Bentley University in Waltham, Massachusetts, told The Lever. “What we call a ‘mature body of knowledge’ is not cheap.” Ledley provided the spending data to The Lever.
That research laid the foundation for the development of Ozempic and triggered a wave of similar drugs that spawned a massive market.
Hellbound and Down 