Novo Nordisk has escalated its battle with chief rival Eli Lilly by filing a federal lawsuit accusing the U.S. drugmaker of running a misleading advertising campaign that exaggerates the superiority of its blockbuster weight loss and diabetes medications over Novo's competing treatments.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, alleges that Eli Lilly violated federal and state false advertising laws by promoting "knowingly outdated clinical trial" results that compare its drugs, Zepbound and Mounjaro, against lower-dose versions of Novo Nordisk's Wegovy and Ozempic. Novo argues that the advertisements fail to reflect more recent data and newly approved higher doses of Wegovy that significantly improve weight loss results.
