Dr. Paul Joyce

Yeah, so the clinical studies have shown that essentially for really chronic kidney disease, people that also have diabetes and kidney disease that can really suppress the progression of that disease.

A drastic number of patients found an added effect when taking the GLP-1 drugs.

Yeah, exactly.

So that people that were not receiving the drug would also benefit.

Absolutely.

I think it will increase demand in Australia, but also worldwide.

Once we started to see this dramatic weight loss potential for these drugs, the shortage was a real issue.

So that was an issue for about three years there.

It doesn't seem to be an issue anymore, but I think with the ever-progressing trials and things like that showing that there is potentially clinical effect for other diseases, I think

Shortage could become an issue again in the future.

And I guess a particular, I guess, interesting point for Australia is that currently Ozempic is not approved by the PBS.

So it means people will have to pay full price for these drugs.

And so it means that in Australia, we have around 50% of people buying the drugs are actually buying it privately and paying that full price.

And so if we have another, I guess, disease or clinical indication that is approved for these drugs, then that's only going to increase demand again.

So currently it's an injection either once or twice weekly.

It's incredibly expensive.

For people that are taking it for weight loss, it's around $300 to $500 a month.

So it's drastic, and I think that does also introduce then equity issues around the drug because not everyone can access it.

So there are concerns around that as well.

Exactly, and I think that's some of the concerns about using these drugs from a cosmetic perspective is all the trials have shown that as soon as you stop taking the drugs, you put the weight back on.