Novo Nordisk, the maker of the popular weight loss drug Wegovy, and OpenAI, known for its AI chatbot ChatGPT, are partnering to accelerate the search for new medications.
The Danish drug manufacturer announced the partnership in a Tuesday press release, noting that the goal was to bring “new and better treatment options to patients faster.”
Novo Nordisk has already made strides in the healthcare industry with its Wegovy pill becoming the first FDA-approved oral GLP-1 drug for weight loss last December.
Within the new partnership, Novo Nordisk will use “advanced AI capabilities” to analyze datasets, identify drug candidates, and speed up the overall timeline from researching a drug to introducing it to patients, according to the release.
Novo Nordisk has reassured the public that the data being analyzed will be protected and the partnership will be overseen by humans to “ensure ethical and compliant use.”
The drug maker will also use OpenAI’s technology to make its manufacturing, supply chain, and distribution and corporate operations more efficient.
“There are millions of people living with obesity and diabetes who need treatment options, and we know there are therapies still waiting to be discovered that could change their lives,” Novo Nordisk CEO Mike Doustdar said in a statement.
“Integrating AI in our everyday work gives us the ability to analyze datasets at a scale that was previously impossible, identify patterns we could not see, and test hypotheses faster than ever,” Doustdar added.
Pilot programs within the partnership will be fully integrated by the end of the year.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman praised the partnership, saying AI can “help people live better, longer lives.”
“This collaboration with Novo Nordisk will help them accelerate scientific discovery, run smarter global operations, and redefine the future of patient care,” Altman said in a statement.
According to a poll released by health policy organization KFF last November, one in eight U.S. adults said they are taking a GLP-1 drug such as Wegovy and Ozempic for weight loss, diabetes or another chronic condition. Nearly one in five adults said they have taken a GLP-1 drug at some point.
Results of a study by Cleveland Clinic published last month found 14.6 percent stopped taking weight-loss drugs because of side effects.
The Independent’s Rhian Lubin heard firsthand from patients who experienced devastating side effects after taking Wegovy and Ozempic, including a nurse practitioner who said she woke up to find she was blind in her right eye and a California man whose wife suddenly died after she suffered a series of violent vomiting episodes.
“If someone would have told me there was a chance that a drug I was taking could make me blind, I would never, ever, have taken the first shot,” Diane Wirth, who went blind in her right eye after taking Wegovy for weight loss, told Lubin.
A Novo Nordisk spokesperson at the time did not comment on the plaintiffs’ individual cases when approached for comment by The Independent, but said that patient safety is the company’s “top priority.”
While some patients claimed to The Independent that they were not warned about the life-altering conditions they have experienced when they started taking weight-loss drugs, Wegovy and Ozempic both warn on their websites of changes in vision and severe stomach problems as possible serious side effects.
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