Opinion: STAT+: How I’m helping companies think through whether they should cover GLP-1s like Ozempic for employees
Employers and employees could fall into opposing camps, with workers demanding the drugs and bosses balking at the cost.
We have a knack in the U.S. for blurring behavior and medicine. Look at weight. For a long time, we’ve treated obesity as a moral failing, a lack of willpower. That was wrong. Now we’re treating weight as a medical issue that can be cured by pill or injection. Is this any better?
Up to 130 million Americans could qualify for Ozempic or other GLP-1s (glucagon-like peptides), which cost nearly $1,000 per month. Never have so many of us been eligible for such an expensive drug. But let’s be honest, even if it were free, is dosing a third to half of the U.S. population a good idea?
Right now GLP-1s are providing not just moments of hope on scales in bathrooms but moments of reckoning in boardrooms. Many Americans are delighted that a monthly injection could offer a solution to obesity — no strict dieting or surgery necessary. Many companies are optimistic about the chance to improve the health of their employees, and, collectively, our country. But rightly, they have questions.
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