Key points:
- The twice-daily Pfizer weight loss pill trial has now been discontinued, joining a lengthy list of previous obesity medications.
- It is evident from Pfizer’s decision to abandon two obesity medication candidates in the past year just how challenging it is to create a weight-loss medication that is safe, effective, and bearable.
- The road to treating obesity was paved with decades’ worth of failures prior to the development of effective weight-reduction medications like Wegovy and Ozempic.
The experimental weight-loss tablet that Pfizer once meant to take twice a day has now been discontinued, joining a lengthy series of medications that were supposed to treat obesity but had unexpected side effects.
Danuglipron is a twice-daily medication that the manufacturer said on Friday it will no longer be developing after obese patients who took it dropped a large amount of weight in a midstage clinical study but also had a high proportion of negative side effects. According to Pfizer, data on a once-daily version of the medication will be made available in the upcoming year in order to “inform the path forward.”
Six months have passed since Pfizer discontinued a separate once-daily tablet in June due to increased liver enzymes. Even with the recent influx of ground-breaking drugs into the obesity market, Pfizer’s decision to abandon two obesity medicine candidates in a matter of months highlights the challenge of creating a weight-loss treatment that is safe, effective, and manageable.
Among them are:
- Novo Nordisk.
- Wegovy, Ozempic’s diabetic medication, and Eli Lilly
- Mounjaro is a diabetic medication.
Over the past year, their popularity has increased dramatically, and their availability has decreased due to their ability to effectively and safely induce noticeable weight reduction. These medications are the newest money-makers for the pharmaceutical business because an estimated 40% of adult Americans are fat.
However, the treatment of obesity had a long history of failures stretching back decades before the present weight reduction industry’s gold rush.
Unintended adverse effects, such as raised liver enzymes, cancer risks, cardiovascular hazards, and significant behavioral issues including suicide, were the main cause of many experimental medicines being abandoned by drugmakers, rejected by US authorities, or finally removed off the market.
Eisai’s Lorcaserin
The Japanese pharmaceutical company Eisai is among the most recent fatalities of experimental obesity medicines. Lorcaserin was taken off the market in 2020 because it raised patients’ chances of developing cancer.
Based on many clinical trials, the Food and Drug Administration approved lorcaserin in 2012; nevertheless, Eisai was mandated to carry out a more extensive and prolonged investigation on the medication subsequent to the approval.
Following five-year research involving around 12,000 patients, the FDA removed the medicine lorcaserin from the market because of the higher rate of cancer diagnoses among lorcaserin users compared to placebo users.
When lorcaserin was commercially accessible, it didn’t seem to acquire any popularity under the Belviq brand. Eisai stated in its full-year 2019 results that Lorcaserin’s U.S. sales were $28.1 million. The medication sold for around $42 million worldwide. For the year, Eisai made around $4.42 billion in sales.
Sanofi’s rimonabant
A Sanofi medication for obesity called rimonabant and Aventis was taken off the market in 2008 as a result of the possibility of major mental health issues, such as suicide.
Remarkably, the medication was never approved in the United States because the FDA’s expert panel rejected the medicine because they believed it may trigger suicidal thoughts. However, rimonabant—sold under the brand name Acomplia—was licensed by European authorities in 2006 after a number of thorough clinical investigations.
Two years later, Rimonabant was recommended to be suspended by European authorities following a committee’s conclusion that the treatment’s hazards, particularly those related to mental health, exceeded its advantages.
By inhibiting the brain’s cannabinoid receptor, which is crucial for controlling the body’s food intake and metabolism, the medication reduced hunger.
The medicine Rimonabant never achieved Sanofi’s ambitious expectations that it would eventually produce $3 billion or more annually because of its short shelf life on the market and inability to obtain clearance in the United States.
Abbott Laboratories’ sibutramine
Due to unforeseen cardiovascular hazards, a number of obesity medications have also been withdrawn from the market, rejected, or stopped.
Abbott Laboratories’ sibutramine is among them, which, when combined with diet and exercise, was historically often used as a therapy for obesity.
Upon its first approval in 1997, the medication came with warnings regarding hypertension and an increased risk of heart attack and stroke in people with cardiovascular conditions.
Since sibutramine was linked to a marked increase in cardiovascular events, according to a major, long-term experiment involving over 10,000 individuals, authorities in the U.S. and Europe removed the medication from both markets in 2010.
Before sibutramine was taken off the market, its sales had been declining. In the first nine months of 2010, the medicine brought in just $80 million worldwide, $20 million of which came from the United States.
According to a recent clinical experiment, weekly injections of Wegovy reduced the total risk of heart attack, stroke, and death from cardiovascular causes by 20%. This shows that the newest class of authorized weight-reduction medications may have the opposite impact on heart health.
