UK regulators find no link between certain GLP-1 drugs, suicidal thoughts

UK regulators have determined there is no causal link between weight-loss and diabetes drugs such as Novo Nordisk’s (NVO) Ozempic and suicidal thoughts.

The UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, or MHRA, said that based on reviews of available evidence, it could not find a causal link between suicidal behavior, suicidal ideation, self-injury and depression and a group of drugs known as GLP-1 receptor agonists.

The reviews included the drugs exenatide, lixisenatide, liraglutide, dulaglutide and semaglutide and were conducted by the market authorization holders of the drugs at the agency’s request.

“The MHRA evaluation of the UK post-marketing data aligned with the conclusions of a European regulatory review which analysed the data from several sources, including post-marketing data, clinical trial data, epidemiological studies and scientific literature,” the MHRA said in a statement.

Exenatide is marketed by AstraZeneca (NASDAQ:AZN) under the names Byetta and Bydureon, while lixisenatide is sold under the names Adlyxin and Lyxumia by Sanofi (NASDAQ:SNY). Novo Nordisk (NVO) markets liraglutide as Victoza and Saxenda, while semaglutide is sold under the names Ozempic and Wegovy. Dulaglutide is marketed by Eli Lilly (NYSE:LLY) as Trulicity. Some of the drugs are also available generically.

“The MHRA will continue to closely monitor the risk of severe psychiatric reactions associated with these receptor agonists and will assess new data as it becomes available,” the agency added in its statement.