look news india
A senior central government official has informed that the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for the production of medicines used for obesity and diabetes will be implemented in the year 2026.
Arunish Chawla, Secretary, Department of Pharmaceuticals, Government of India, said that this scheme will give a big boost to the domestic production of GLP-1 drugs. Notably, advanced formulations of GLP-1 drugs such as Novo Nordisk's Ozempic and Eli Lilly's Zepbound are currently not available in the Indian market. Since the global supply of these formulations is currently less than the demand, it is unlikely that these drugs will be available in the Indian market in the near future. Keeping this in mind, the government is considering launching this new PLI scheme. However, developing the formulations of these drugs is also a long process, so this scheme will be launched after the production base of such advanced formulations is established.
Obesity drug market to reach $130 billion by 2030
Currently, companies such as Sun Pharma, Cipla and Lupin manufacture GLP-1 drugs in India and these drugs are used in the treatment of type-2 diabetes and obesity. According to a report by Goldman Sachs, the market size of anti-obesity drugs is estimated to reach $130 billion by 2030.
In India, 8 crore people are obese, 22 crore people are overweight
According to a survey published in The Lancet in 2022, India ranks third in the world in terms of the number of obese people, followed by China and the US. According to another survey by IMARC, 8 crore people in India are suffering from obesity and the number of overweight people is more than 22 crore.
China attempts to develop weight loss drugs
According to data from China's National Health Commission, more than 50 percent of its adult population is obese or overweight. To address this problem, China is working hard to develop weight loss drugs in partnership with Eli Lilly and Innovent Biologics and these drugs are expected to be launched in 2025.