Novo Nordisk sues Eli Lilly over GLP-1 ads

Novo Nordisk On Tuesday, a lawsuit was filed against Eli LillyAlleging that its advertising campaigns for popular obesity and diabetes drugs are designed to mislead consumers about their superior effectiveness compared to the Danish pharmaceutical company’s competing injections.

Novo, in particular, has taken issue with nationwide ads citing what it called “outdated” clinical trials comparing higher doses of Lilly’s drugs to lower doses of Novo’s. For example, these campaigns do not include new evidence about Novo’s recently approved high-dose version of obesity injection, Wegovy, which entered the market in March and results in weight loss more comparable to Lilly’s products.

That “leaves them with the inevitable conclusion that Lilly’s drugs are superior to Novo’s, and that’s not accurate,” John Kockelman, Novo’s general counsel, said in an interview Monday. He said the lawsuit comes after Lilly refused to pull or correct some ads despite a formal cease-and-desist order from Novo in April.

In the lawsuit filed in the US District Court for the District of New Jersey, Novo asked the court to permanently stop Lilly from running ads and to require the drug company to issue corrective ads. Novo is also seeking financial damages, although it is unclear how much. The company said it has also warned Lilly that if the ads are not removed voluntarily, it plans to seek a preliminary injunction in the coming days to block them immediately while the case continues.

Lilly said in a statement on Tuesday that it stands “strongly behind our advertising.” The company also said that “the gold standard for comparing drugs is a robustly designed, well-conducted head-to-head clinical trial,” like the one it uses in its advertising campaigns to compare the obesity injection, Zepbound, to Wegovy. This remains the only study that pits these drugs directly against each other.

“It’s honest, transparent, and based on the direct scientific evidence available — which is exactly what patients deserve,” Lilly said. “We will continue to focus on the science and vigorously defend against this lawsuit.”

The lawsuit comes as Novo wages an aggressive battle against Lilly to regain market share in the GLP-1 space, positioning its new obesity pills, strategic price cuts and new high-dose Wegovy to compete with top-selling obesity injections from rival Zepbound and diabetes peer Mounjaro.

In recent years, Lilly medications have become the preferred treatments in this area among many providers and patients due to their high effectiveness. But high-dose Wegovy, which has shown an average weight loss of about 19%, is a direct answer to that.

Specifically, Novo said, it brings federal and state unfair competition and false advertising claims, including under the Lanham Act, which drug companies have relied on in the past to hold competitors liable for deceptive advertising.

The lawsuit alleges that Lilly’s campaigns across television and social media are harmful because consumers often rely on ads to form their understanding of GLP-1s, unlike health care professionals, who have access to the full scientific evidence available.

“Lily’s advertising campaign deprives consumers of the honest, current and complete information they need to make informed decisions about their treatment options,” the lawsuit states.

The lawsuit cites a television ad featuring Zepbound and Wegovy in a direct side-by-side comparison, visually and verbally explaining that patients taking Lilly’s drug lost an average of 50 pounds compared to 33 pounds when taking the 2.4-milligram dose of Novo’s treatment. This is based on a previous head-to-head clinical trial comparing the highest doses of Zepbound to 1.7 and 2.4 milligram doses of Wegovy.

But a more recent study showed that the high 7.2 milligram dose of Wejovi helped patients lose an average of 47 pounds, which is “clinically consistent” with Zibbond’s weight loss in Lilly’s most recent rigorous trial of the drug, Novo said in the lawsuit.

Lilly acknowledges the presence of high-dose WiGovvi in ​​a “small footnote,” but called it “vague, confusing, almost illegible and woefully inadequate,” because it does not indicate that it is significantly more effective than lower doses of the drug, Novo said.

No head-to-head trials have compared the highest doses of Wegovy and Zepbound currently on the market, so Lilly has “no basis to make these comparative claims” that its drugs are more effective, Novo added in the lawsuit.

“While it may be accurate to say that before 7.2 milligrams became available for Wegovy, it is no longer accurate to say that,” Kockelman said. “We believe they have a legal obligation, but more importantly, a responsibility to patients to share accurate information.”

The suit added that Zepbound’s TV ad has received more than 700 million impressions since it began airing around the end of April, illustrating the extent of the competitive damage Novo has suffered.

The lawsuit alleges that Lilly takes the same approach when comparing the effectiveness of Mounjaro and Ozempic in its ads, withholding new data on a higher dose of Novo, which was approved more than four years ago.

“We feel like we have a very strong case here that we can show that Lilly actually misled consumers through the ads,” Kockelman said.