Eli Lilly CEO Dave Ricks said Friday that upcoming Medicare coverage of obesity drugs could be a major catalyst for the company’s rollout of Orforglipron, an experimental weight-loss drug it is closely monitoring.
In an exclusive interview with CNBC, Ricks said Lilly “will be covered by Medicare shortly after that launches, so that’s going to change things a little bit.”
He said that’s because many patients now pay cash for competitors. novo nordiskGLP-1 tablets for obesity. It launched earlier this month and is off to a strong start despite uneven coverage.
Ricks said he noticed that almost all of the early adopters of Novo’s Wigovy tablets were new to GLP-1 therapy, rather than users of existing injectables. “It’s widespread, it’s reaching more patients, and that’s great.”
He added that Lilly is confident in the competitiveness of its tablets and is preparing for a “full-scale launch” in the second quarter. The rollout is expected to coincide with Medicare beginning coverage for the first obesity drugs later this year under a drug pricing agreement Lilly and Novo struck with President Donald Trump in November.
Eli Lilly CEO Dave Ricks speaks at a press conference in Houston on September 23, 2025.
Antranik Tabitian | Reuters
Rix said the government compensation would further reduce the price of the pill in the second half of this year. Some Medicare patients will pay a $50 monthly copayment for all approved uses of injectable and oral GLP-1 drugs, including treatments for diabetes and obesity.
“This opens us up quite a bit, so we’ll see how far we can go from there,” Ricks said.
Medicare coverage for obesity treatment is a long-awaited move, and some medical experts say it could expand the market for the drugs and encourage more private insurers to cover them. Ricks estimates that 20 million to 30 million Medicare beneficiaries with obesity and related health conditions could be eligible for GLP-1 treatment, making the coverage a “huge demographic multiplier.”
Mr Rix confirmed that under the drug pricing agreement, a “step-down in prices” would take place at the beginning of this year. The agreement includes drug companies voluntarily offering their drugs at lower prices, including selling existing treatments to Medicaid patients at the lowest foreign prices and guaranteeing so-called most-favored-nation prices for new drugs.
But Ricks said Lilly’s drug volume growth “will accelerate starting in the second half of this year.”
“We think this is a positive balance for us, but only time will tell,” he said, adding that it will be based on Medicare patient uptake of the treatment and the company’s share of its implementation.
He said Lilly plans to provide more details about the financial impact of the deal when it releases its fourth-quarter results and 2026 outlook next week.
The price agreement includes a promise to sell the drug at a discounted cash-pay price on President Trump’s direct-to-consumer platform, TrumpRx. The site was scheduled to launch in January, but is not yet up and running.
Ricks said Lilly was the first drug company to sell obesity drugs directly to patients through its LillyDirect platform, and TrumpRx is “extending that across the industry” to other drugs.
“We’re all for it,” he said.
