Novo Nordisk is trialling its weight-loss drugs to explore if they can reduce alcohol intake and treat alcoholic liver disease, as it seeks to expand the uses of the blockbuster treatments.
The Danish pharmaceutical company has started recruitment for a mid-stage trial looking at whether an estimated 240 patients using semaglutide, the active ingredient in Wegovy, and cagrilintide, an ingredient in another Novo Nordisk drug in development for weight loss, can treat liver damage and reduce alcohol use in participants with alcoholic liver disease.
Novo Nordisk is already assessing semaglutide’s effects in liver disease linked to obesity — metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis — but this is the first study to assess the effectiveness of the new generation of weight-loss treatments on alcoholic liver disease, which kills more than 30,000 Americans a year.