Zepbound Sheds More Weight Than Wegovy, Study Finds
Obese and overweight adults taking tirzepatide (the generic name for Zepbound and Mounjaro) lost more weight and lost it faster than adults taking semaglutide (the generic name for Wegovy and Ozempic) according to new peer reviewed research published in JAMA Internal Medicine.
While most overweight or obese adults experience weight loss when treated with tirzepatide and semaglutide, tirzepatide was “associated with significantly greater weight loss,” the researchers said.
The findings come from an analysis of the electronic health records of more than 18,000 U.S. adults who were receiving either drug between May 2022 and September 2023 and had their weight loss monitored over the course of a year, with subjects “matched” to reduce the chance of variables like other health conditions influencing the outcome.
After a year, the adults treated with tirzepatide were 76% more likely to have achieved weight loss of at least 5% compared to those taking semaglutide, 154% more likely of achieving at least a 10% reduction and 224% more likely of achieving a loss of 15% or greater, the researchers found.
When measured at three-, six- and 12-month milestones, the adults taking tirzepatide lost 2.4% more weight at three months, 4.3% more at six months and 6.9% more at 12 months, the researchers said, adding that while clinical outcomes varied, both groups experienced similar side effects at similar rates.
The researchers said the study is the first to compare the two drugs head-to-head in obese and overweight patients, though they noted their findings are largely consistent with evidence on the drugs from randomized clinical trials, often considered the gold standard of medical research.
WHICH WEIGHT LOSS DRUG IS BETTER?
While faster and more clinically meaningful weight loss is a definite boon for Lilly’s Zepbound, it is unlikely to replace Novo’s Wegovy any time soon. Foremost, both drugs offer a kind of weight loss previously unachievable from a medical intervention absent surgery and both have been widely hailed as public health game changers in the fight against obesity by clinicians and health experts. That one drug might offer a greater degree of weight loss doesn’t diminish the effect of the other and, even if it did, persistent supply shortages for both products mean the market would likely still welcome a similar, if inferior, product. In the long term, experts told Forbes there is a natural limit to the advantages improvements to a measure like weight loss can give a company as it can only go so far before benefits taper off. Rather than focus on inducing more significant and more rapid weight loss, companies will likely seek to gain an edge by focusing on generating more lasting weight loss, focusing on shedding fat rather than muscle, as well as other clinical benefits such as treating kidney disease, sleep apnea or cardiovascular health and other ways of delivering the drug like through a tablet rather than a weekly injection.
WHAT TO WATCH FOR
“Future work is needed to compare the effect of tirzepatide and semaglutide on other key end points,” the researchers said, such as reducing major cardiovascular events. Novo, which brought semaglutide to market years before tirzepatide, has already secured a label expansion for Wegovy to include cardiovascular benefits and while it’s reasonable to assume a similar benefit might derive from Zepbound and other similar drugs, Lilly will need to collect data to prove this in order to market it as such. It’s possible these other benefits might differ in an independent way to the weight loss outcomes of the drugs, which could open up new ways of differentiating and marketing the medicines.
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