{"id":744642,"date":"2026-08-21T02:00:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T02:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/744642\/"},"modified":"2026-08-21T02:00:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T02:00:08","slug":"fat-jabs-drive-nhs-to-spend-twice-as-much-treating-diabetes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/744642\/","title":{"rendered":"Fat jabs drive NHS to spend twice as much treating diabetes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ozempic and Mounjaro have helped drive a doubling in NHS<\/a> spending on diabetes treatments.<\/p>\n

The cost of medicines and devices used to treat diabetes in England reached a record \u00a32.3bn last year, up from \u00a3985m a decade ago.<\/p>\n

The rise has been fuelled by a new generation of drugs that have become best known for their dramatic effect on weight<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mounjaro prescriptions nearly trebled in one year, rising from 1.1 million to 3.1 million items. Spending on the drug rose dramatically, too, increasing from \u00a3120m to \u00a3574m.<\/p>\n

Mounjaro and Ozempic were originally developed as treatments for diabetes<\/a>, and lower blood sugar while also suppressing appetite.<\/p>\n

Mounjaro is now prescribed by the NHS for both type 2 diabetes and weight management, while Ozempic is licensed for diabetes. Semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic, is marketed as Wegovy when prescribed specifically for weight loss.<\/p>\n

However, the new figures do not specify whether prescriptions were issued specifically for diabetes, meaning some of the rise reflects the NHS rollout of Mounjaro for weight loss<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In total, the class of medication known as GLP-1 receptor agonists accounted for 33 per cent of the total cost of all drugs that can be used for diabetes.<\/p>\n

Spending on diabetes prescriptions<\/p>\n

The figures, published by the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA), show diabetes treatments account for a fifth of spending on all prescribed items in England. That compares with 11 per cent in 2016-17.<\/p>\n

In 2025-26, 83 million prescription items covered by the statistics were issued to 4.1 million identified patients in England. That was a 60 per cent increase from 52 million items in 2016-17.<\/p>\n

However, spending increased by 135 per cent over the same period, as newer and more expensive treatments became more widely used.<\/p>\n

GLP-1 drugs, including Mounjaro and Ozempic, account for a disproportionate share of the bill. They made up 6 per cent of all prescription items covered by the figures, but accounted for 33 per cent of total costs.<\/p>\n

The NHSBSA said much of the increase over the decade had been driven by GLP-1 drugs, alongside other newer treatments and technology. These include SGLT2 inhibitors, which lower blood sugar by helping the kidneys remove glucose from the body through urine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ozempic and Mounjaro have helped drive a doubling in NHS spending on diabetes treatments. The cost of medicines…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":744643,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[5573,59,102,4499,50,200201,236,578,5438,56,225,54,55,4405],"class_list":["post-744642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-diabetes","tag-gb","tag-health","tag-health-news","tag-news","tag-nhs-national-health-service","tag-obesity","tag-ozempic","tag-standard","tag-uk","tag-uk-news","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-weight-loss"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/744642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=744642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/744642\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/744643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=744642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=744642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=744642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}