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Airlines to Save Big Money on Fuel as New Weight Loss Pills Gain Popularity, Wall Street Says
Wall Street is finding an unexpected beneficiary of America’s weight loss boom: airlines.
With the first GLP-1 weight loss drug now available in pill form, analysts at Jefferies say broad adoption across society could quietly lower fuel bills — airlines’ single largest cost — and lift earnings for the carriers. “A slimmer society = lower fuel consumption.
Airlines have a history of being vigilant around aircraft weight savings, from olives (pitless, of course) to paper stock,” the Wall Street firm said in a note to clients. Jefferies contended that a 10% reduction in average passenger weight could translate into roughly 2% total aircraft weight savings, up to 1.5% lower fuel costs and as much as a 4% boost to earnings per share.
Patients are already getting their hands on the first GLP-1 pill for obesity from Novo Nordisk, and a similar product from Eli Lilly isn’t far behind, with U.S. approval expected within months. By eliminating the need for self-injection, pills are widely expected to attract first-time patients to obesity treatments. Jefferies estimates the implications could be material for the largest U.S. carriers, led by American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines and Southwest Airlines.
The Hard Truth of Weight-Loss Drugs: You Probably Need Them Forever
Weight-loss drugs like Wegovy require a lifetime commitment. Stop taking them, and you’ll almost always gain back the weight you lost. But many patients don’t want to hear that. Dr. Padmaja Akkireddy, an endocrinologist at Nebraska Medicine, estimated that more than half of her patients don’t want to stay on a weight-loss drug long term. And data shows that most Americans quit the drugs within a year of starting them.
Even Oprah Winfrey said that she stopped taking a weight-loss drug “cold turkey” for a year, then gained back 20 pounds. “I tried to beat the medication,” she told People magazine. It was then that she realized “It’s going to be a lifetime thing,” she told the magazine. Many people have to stop taking the drugs because they can no longer afford them. Others grow tired of side effects like fatigue, nausea and constipation. Some just don’t want to rely on a drug forever.
Frequently, patients believe they will be the exception, said Dr. Michelle Hauser, the obesity medicine director of the Stanford Lifestyle and Weight Management Center. They seem to think, “That’s not going to be me, I’m not going to take them forever,” Dr. Hauser said. Medical authorities at the highest level have pushed that misconception. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., for one, has said weight-loss drugs can allow people to “reset,” suggesting they are a temporary bridge, not a long-term tool.
Fast-Tracked Drug Approvals Pose Safety Risks, Study Shows
A new study co-written by a University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign expert in operations management finds that drugs approved under the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s “Breakthrough Therapy Designation” — a program designed to expedite promising drug treatments to patients — are associated with a significantly higher number of serious adverse events after reaching the market.
The Breakthrough Therapy Designation was created in 2012 to allow drugs showing early promise in treating serious or life-threatening conditions to move through the FDA approval process faster. The designation has since become an express lane for new drug approvals, particularly in the treatment of cancer.
While the program has been widely praised by patients and firms for accelerating access to new pharmaceuticals, questions have persisted about whether speed is coming at the expense of safety, Tyagi said. “That criticism was the loudest during the COVID-19 vaccine approval process, and there was also a controversy with a drug that showed promise in slowing down Alzheimer’s disease symptoms,” Tyagi said.
South Carolina Schools Face Measles Risk as Vaccination Rates Drop to 20%, State Epidemiologist Warns
Vaccination rates in some South Carolina schools have dropped to as low as 20%, raising concerns about potential measles outbreaks, state epidemiologist Linda Bell said on Wednesday. “The concern is that these pockets within even the Spartanburg County area, for example, there are schools that have vaccination coverage that is as low as 20% in some particular school settings,” Bell told reporters during a measles briefing.
The South Carolina health department reported 434 measles cases related to the ongoing outbreak in the state on Tuesday, 124 additional cases since its last update on Friday. The widening outbreak has been reported in the northwest part of the state, which includes Greenville and Spartanburg, according to the South Carolina Department of Public Health.
Former Biotech CEO Sued Over COVID Vaccine Alleged Insider Trading
The former chief executive of a biopharmaceutical company used insider information about contamination in a COVID-19 vaccine to make more than $10 million in trades, the New York Attorney General’s office alleged Thursday in a new lawsuit against the executive, Robert Kramer.
Kramer was the CEO of Emergent BioSolutions, a government contractor hired to mass produce coronavirus vaccine doses, 400 million of which had to be destroyed in 2021 because of contamination at Emergent’s plant in Baltimore. Before the contamination issues were made public, Kramer sold his company shares and received $10.1 million, according to the attorney general’s lawsuit, which seeks damages, disgorgement and costs.
“Corporate executives who use insider information to illegally trade company stocks and make a profit betray the public’s trust,” said New York Attorney General Letitia James in a statement announcing the lawsuit. “At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Robert Kramer illegally profited millions by selling his company shares, while knowing that Emergent faced issues producing the AstraZeneca vaccine for millions of people. Kramer’s actions were illegal and unethical, and we are holding him accountable.”
James said Emergent agreed to pay $900,000 in penalties for approving Kramer’s trading plan, in violation of New York’s Martin Act, which prohibits insider trading.
