Fewer than 10% of patients eligible to benefit from weight-loss injections including Wegovy can access them, states the WHO as it issues its inaugural guidance on the medications.
Given over a billion individuals worldwide currently obese, it is advocating for more widespread and fairer access to this class of drugs.
According to estimates, in excess of 2,000,000,000 will be living with obesity by 2030 without intervention.
"The new guidelines acknowledges that excess weight is a lifelong illness that can be addressed with holistic and ongoing treatment," stated its chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
High costs, limited production capacity, and logistical bottlenecks are key hurdles to broad availability to the jabs that can help people shift significant weight, notes the body.
GLP-1 Therapy Shortage
Even in the present most favorable outlook, the supply of such drugs might only reach around 100 million people – less than 10% of the global need, per the WHO.
The advice encourages countries and companies to widen availability, by approaches such as voluntary licensing.
A patent on semaglutide – the main ingredient of a leading brand – is scheduled to end in several countries in 2026.
How Obesity Drugs Function
These medications replicate a natural hormone to reduce digestion speed, suppress the appetite and boost the sense of being full so individuals reduce food intake.
People typically begin shedding pounds in the initial weeks of starting on the once-weekly jabs.
Evidence indicates patients may see weight return after a year of halting the medication, when their normal food cravings return.
To be overweight or obese increases your chance for contracting diseases, like diabetes, heart disease, brain attack, and specific malignancies.
Excess weight impacts people in countries worldwide and was linked to over three and a half million fatalities worldwide in 2024, according to the WHO.
