Some states say they can't afford Ozempic and other weight-loss drugs
Joanna Bailey, a family doctor and obesity specialist, doesn't want to tell her patients they can't take Wegovy, but she's gotten used to it.About a quarter of the people he sees at his small clinic in Wyoming County would benefit from the weight-loss drugs known as GLP-1, which also include Ozempic, Zepbound and Mounjaro, he says. The drugs helped some of them lose 15 to 20 percent of their weight. But most people in the area where she operates don't have insurance that covers the costs, and virtually no one can afford prices of $1,000 to $1,400 a month.“Even my wealthiest patients can't afford it,” Dr. Bailey said. He then mentioned something that many doctors in West Virginia – among the poorest states in the country, with the highest prevalence of obesity, at 41%...