Diabetes patients searching 50 pharmacies for the drug now in a shortage due to prescriptions for weight loss

Desperate diabetics are driving to 50 pharmacies in search of the drug to lower their blood sugar levels due to dire shortages created by doctors also prescribing Ozempic for weight loss.

Doctors are warning there will be a shortage of the drug until late 2024.

Distressed diabetes patients have been warned Ozempic shortages will continue until the end of next year as doctors increasingly prescribe the drug for weight loss.

Australia’s medicine regulator and manufacturer Novo Nordisk have revealed that even with a sharp increase in supply, there was still not enough of the drug to meet demand until December 2024.

Some diabetes patients who were on Ozempic, which is subsidised on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, are being put on a replacement that costs at least $315 a month.

Doctors say patients are driving to 50 pharmacies in a desperate search for the drug.

Ozempic was designed to help people with chronic type 2 diabetes lower their blood sugar by

making more insulin, but it also aids weight loss.

More than 300,000 Victorians have type 2 diabetes with around 20 per cent prescribed drugs such as Ozempic to control their blood sugar.

Robbie Williams has revealed he is using Ozempic. Picture: Ayda Field/Instagram

Monash Health’s head of Diabetes Jennifer Wong believes the severe shortage of Ozempic is

worsening and says many patients are now being forced to change medications, try a lower dose or shop around.

“It is very distressing because many patients are putting the weight back on because they have no alternatives,” she said.

“A lot of them have unfortunately been through this (supply shortage) before, and to have it

happening again is disheartening.”

Associate Prof Wong said priority should be given to those patients with type 2 diabetes who are stabilised on the medication who have no other alternatives.

The Therapeutic Goods Authority (TGA) blamed the shortage on “unexpected demand in off-label prescribing for weight loss”.

Ozempic’s Danish manufacturer Novo Nordisk has run its factories 24 hours a day to meet global appetite for the drug.

Tik Tok influencers and celebrities including pop star Robbie Williams who claimed he was diagnosed with “type 2 self-loathing” have driven demand for Ozempic.

The TGA has told doctors not to prescribe Ozempic for weight-loss — which is not subsidised by the PBS — but says it is unable to stop them.

It has also continued to recommend doctors against starting any new diabetic patients on Ozempic.

Monash Health gastroenterologist Suong Le said an increasing number of Victorians were bypassing their GPs and instead getting Ozempic scripts for weight loss from telehealth operators.

“This is the new frontier for health in Australia and globally: is healthcare still a service driven by clinical need or is it driven by consumer demand for products like Ozempic? It is a real test for clinical governance, and it is a real risk for accelerating healthcare inequity,” Associate Professor Le said.

Some doctors prescribe Ozempic off-label to treat obesity.

Novo Nordisk told this masthead that “supply in Australia improved significantly in 2023” but “there continues to be strong demand.”

 “Novo Nordisk has advised the TGA there will be continued, limited intermittent availability in Australia of Ozempic, a medicine approved for use in adults with type 2 diabetes,

until December 2024,” the company said.

“Our deliveries of Ozempic to Australia in 2023 were significantly more than

compared to 2022.”

The company now has a market value of more than $500 billion, boosted when the UK government in March approved it to be used for weight loss by the National Health Service.

Leading endocrinologist John Wentworth from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute (WEHI) and the Royal Melbourne Hospital says injectable drug treatments such as Ozempic were “game changers”.

“The thing that is very clear is that there are two markets: people with diabetes and then the market for obesity,” Professor Wentworth said.

Diabetic Melbourne grandmother Polly Dyer said Ozempic had changed her life after it helped her to shed 30kg.

She says supply shortages had stripped her of her “lifeline” and that in the months she has been unable to get her correct dose, she has put most of the weight back on.

Ms Dyer is pleading with Victorians to only use supplies of the drug for “health reasons”.

“I am doing it for my health, not just to lose weight,” Ms Dyer said. “Without it I am back on insulin

and steroids. I am in a no-win situation. I did so well for so long.”

Tik Tok influencers touting Ozempic drug for weight loss.

Tik Tok images of Ozempic comments.

Pop superstar Robbie Williams was the latest to talk of his dramatic weight loss in an upcoming Netflix documentary on his life.

In an interview with The Times last week he described Ozempic as “like a Christmas miracle” and said he had dropped around 12 kilograms in just a few months after becoming a fan of the “skinny jab”.

“Babe, I’m on Ozempic,” he told The Times. “Well, something like Ozempic.

“And I need it, medically. I’ve been diagnosed with type 2 self-loathing. It’s shockingly catastrophic to my mental health to be bigger.”

Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute deputy director Jonathan Shaw said the uncertainty over supply not only impacted diabetic patients who rely on Ozempic, but also those still investigating which treatment suited them best.

“I can’t really tell whether or not this drug is working, because they’re not really getting it enough of the time to be able to determine that,” he said.

“I had one patient who told me they got it at the 51st pharmacy that they rang.”

Some have questioned Tik Tok talking about Ozempic.

Professor Shaw said the ongoing local shortage showed doctors had continued to prescribe the drug off-label for weight-loss in Australia – going against the TGA’s advice – but warned it was not a simple issue.

“There aren’t enough people with diabetes [in Australia] who need the medication that would cause a problem of lack of supply,” he said.

“We also have to recognise that while in truth there are many different drugs we can use for diabetes, there really aren’t for obesity.”

The Federal Health Department said it did not have data on how many times Ozempic has been prescribed for weight loss.