{"id":525354,"date":"2026-06-30T06:26:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T06:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/525354\/"},"modified":"2026-06-30T06:26:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T06:26:10","slug":"wegovy-canada-approves-first-generic-version-for-weight-loss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/525354\/","title":{"rendered":"Wegovy: Canada approves first generic version for weight loss"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"b-date-custom__date-item\">Updated:\u00a0June 29, 2026 at 7:24PM EDT<\/p>\n<p class=\"b-date-custom__date-item\">Published:\u00a0June 29, 2026 at 6:43PM EDT<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Canada has approved its first generic version of the weight-loss drug Wegovy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Health Canada announced Monday that it has authorized <a href=\"https:\/\/dhpp.hpfb-dgpsa.ca\/dhpp\/resource\/107181\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Svemia<\/a>, a once-weekly semaglutide injection made by Canadian pharmaceutical company Apotex, for chronic weight management in people aged 12 and older \u201cas a supplement to a reduced-calorie diet and increased physical activity for chronic weight management.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">The approval marks the first generic semaglutide injection authorized in Canada for weight loss. The drug is a generic version of Novo Nordisk\u2019s Wegovy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Health Canada said it approved the medication after determining that evidence submitted by the company met the department\u2019s standards for safety, efficacy and quality for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.canada.ca\/en\/health-canada\/services\/drugs-health-products\/drug-products\/fact-sheets\/access-to-generic-drugs.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">generic drugs<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/3AXPOH3ABRA5TDHANC3NDQK26Q.jpg\"  width=\"800\" height=\"600\"\/>semaglutide Canada has approved its first generic version of the weight-loss drug Wegovy. (Pexels) <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">The department said it is also reviewing six additional submissions for generic semaglutide products from other manufacturers and expects to make more regulatory decisions in the coming weeks and months.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Generic semaglutide products are considered pharmaceutically equivalent to the brand-name drug, and Health Canada said its review ensures that any differences between the products do not affect their safety, effectiveness or quality.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">The department said greater availability of generic semaglutide could lead to lower costs for patients and the health-care system. In Canada, generic medications are often priced between 45 and 90 per cent below their brand-name counterparts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">The approval follows <a href=\"https:\/\/www.canada.ca\/en\/health-canada\/news\/2026\/05\/canada-approves-second-generic-semaglutide-the-first-g7-country-to-do-so.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Health Canada\u2019s authorization on May 1<\/a> of a generic semaglutide injection from Apotex for adults with Type 2 diabetes. <\/p>\n<p>Related Stories<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Updated:\u00a0June 29, 2026 at 7:24PM EDT Published:\u00a0June 29, 2026 at 6:43PM EDT Canada has approved its first generic&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":525355,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[10787,103,61,60,371],"class_list":["post-525354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-medication","tag-apple-news","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-medication"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=525354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525354\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/525355"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=525354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=525354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=525354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}