\n The Trump administration is nearing deals with drugmakers Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk to offer some of their obesity drugs to consumers for as low as $149 per month, according to two people familiar with the negotiations.\n <\/p>\n
\n The agreements would also clear the way for Medicare to cover the drugs for certain beneficiaries \u2014 a move that could broaden the market for medications like Wegovy, Zepbound and Mounjaro that have already proven widely popular despite their steep prices. The list price of the drugs range from roughly $1,000 to $1,350, though the price consumers pay depends on their insurance and on discounts.\n <\/p>\n
\n President Donald Trump is expected to announce the deals as soon as Thursday, though the people familiar with the negotiations cautioned that they are not finalized and that officials are still working through key policy details.\n <\/p>\n
\n In a statement, White House spokesman Kush Desai said that \u201cdiscussion about deals that have not been officially announced by the administration should be regarded as speculation.\u201d Press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Tuesday declined to confirm the planned announcement, but said a deal that cuts the cost of the obesity drugs was \u201csomething that the administration has been engaged and looking into.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n The negotiations over Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk\u2019s obesity drugs represent perhaps the highest-profile element of a broader White House push to cut drug prices by striking individual deals with pharmaceutical manufacturers.\n <\/p>\n
\n The \u201cMost Favored Nation\u201d initiative has so far resulted in agreements with Pfizer, AstraZeneca and other companies to sell certain products directly to consumers at a reduced price \u2014 often in exchange for relief from the threat of targeted tariffs. Eli Lilly<\/a> and Novo Nordisk<\/a> already provide their weight loss drugs at a discount directly to consumers who pay cash.\n <\/p>\n \n Yet Trump has fixated in particular on striking a deal for GLP-1 medications that have exploded in popularity in recent years for helping with weight loss and a range of chronic conditions. The president has referred to them in both public and private as the \u201cfat-loss drug.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWe\u2019re going to be paying, instead of $1,300, you\u2019ll be paying about $150,\u201d Trump said of the GLP-1 drugs during a mid-October event highlighting a separate drug price deal, prompting US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services chief Mehmet Oz to jump in and emphasize that the negotiations were still ongoing.\n <\/p>\n \n Endpoints News first reported<\/a> that deals were approaching the finish line.\n <\/p>\n \n It\u2019s unclear exactly which of the companies\u2019 drugs will be sold for $149 and whether there will be restrictions on consumers\u2019 access to them. The deals are related to a pilot program that CMS is in the final stages of developing aimed at capping the cost of the obesity drugs for some Medicare beneficiaries, one of the people familiar with the negotiations said.\n <\/p>\n \n The expected deals with Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk follow a yearslong debate on both sides of the aisle over whether Medicare and Medicaid should cover the pricey drugs. The Biden administration last year officially proposed expanding coverage of them, though the plan was not finalized before Trump took office. The Trump administration said in April that it was halting<\/a> the proposal but left the door open to consider future policy options for covering the drugs.\n <\/p>\n \n Also, notably, Ozempic and Wegovy were selected in January for second round of Medicare drug price negotiations<\/a>, which is expected to result in savings for the program and, possibly, for enrollees depending on their drug coverage.\n <\/p>\n