Elie Lilly CEO Dave Ricks said Friday that Medicare’s upcoming coverage of obesity drugs could be a major catalyst for the rollout of the company’s closely watched experimental weight-loss pill, or forglipron.
In an exclusive interview with CNBC, Ricks said Lilly expects to have Medicare coverage for the treatment “immediately after this launch, and that will be a bit of a game changer as well.”
He said that’s because many patients currently pay cash for a competitor. Novo NordiskThe GLP-1 pill for obesity. This launched earlier this month and is off to a good start, even with spotty insurance coverage.
Ricks said he’s noticed that almost all of the early adopters of Novo’s Wegovy pill are new to GLP-1 treatments rather than users of existing injections, so “it’s broad, it’s reaching more patients and it’s great.”
He added that Lilly is confident in the competitive ability of its pill and is preparing for a “full launch” in the second quarter. The rollout is expected to coincide with Medicare starting to cover obesity drugs for the first time later this year as part of drug pricing deals Lilly and Novo reached with President Donald Trump in November.
Eli Lilly CEO Dave Ricks speaks during a press conference in Houston, September 23, 2025.
Antranik Tavitien | Reuters
This government coverage will drive the price of pills down further in the second half of the year, Ricks said. Some Medicare patients will pay a $50 per month copay for all approved uses of injectable and oral GLP-1 medications, including treatment of diabetes and obesity.
“It opens things up pretty wide and we’ll see where we can go from there,” Ricks said.
Medicare coverage of obesity treatments is a long-awaited measure that some health experts say could expand the market for the drugs and encourage more private insurers to cover them. Ricks estimates that 20 to 30 million Medicare beneficiaries with obesity and related health conditions could be eligible for GLP-1 treatments, so the coverage is a “large multiplier on the eligible pool.”
Ricks acknowledged that under the drug pricing agreement there will be “a drop in prices” early this year. The agreements involve drugmakers voluntarily offering their drugs at a lower price, including selling their existing treatments to Medicaid patients at the lowest prices overseas, and guaranteeing the most favored nation price for new drugs.
But Ricks said Lilly’s drug volume growth “is going to accelerate in the second half of the year.”
“We think it’s a positive outcome for us, but time will tell,” he said, adding that it will depend on adoption of the treatments by Medicare patients and the company’s share of that adoption.
Lilly will share more details on the financial impact of the deal when it reports fourth-quarter results and 2026 guidance next week, he said.
The pricing agreements include commitments to launch drugs at discounted spot prices on Trump’s direct-to-consumer platform, TrumpRx. This site, which was to be launched in January, is not yet online.
Ricks said Lilly was the first drugmaker to sell obesity treatments directly to patients through the company’s platform, LillyDirect, and that TrumpRx “takes that and extends it industry-wide” to other drugs.
“We’re all for this,” he said.