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The prevalence and consequences of support for off-label Ozempic prescriptions

Timothy Callaghan et al.

Health Economics, Policy and Law2025https://doi.org/10.1017/s1744133124000306article
ABDC B
Weight
0.57

Abstract

Ozempic and related semaglutide drugs represent a popular new strategy to address obesity in the United States, yet uptake of these medications has sparked opposition highlighting concerns about off-label drug use policies, drug safety, supply shortages and cost. Public attitudes towards off-label prescribing by physicians broadly, and towards Ozempic in particular, in light of this opposition are unclear. To better understand public sentiment on this topic, we analysed data from a representative survey of 3,420 US adults conducted from 13 to 22 June 2023. Public attitudes towards off-label prescribing were split, with 46.3 percent supporting physician discretion to prescribe off-label. Importantly though, 58 percent of respondents were at least somewhat concerned about Ozempic supply shortages caused by off-label use and 63 percent were concerned about Ozempic safety in the context of off-label use. Further analysis from an embedded survey experiment shows that rhetoric highlighting safety (but not supply) concerns surrounding off-label Ozempic prescribing is associated with a significant drop in support for off-label use. These results suggest that the introduction of obesity drugs like Ozempic present a pharmaceutical industry-led path for combatting obesity, but rhetoric opposing these drugs could blunt public support and uptake.

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1017/s1744133124000306

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@article{timothy2025,
  title        = {{The prevalence and consequences of support for off-label Ozempic prescriptions}},
  author       = {Timothy Callaghan et al.},
  journal      = {Health Economics, Policy and Law},
  year         = {2025},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1017/s1744133124000306},
}

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The prevalence and consequences of support for off-label Ozempic prescriptions

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Evidence weight

0.57

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.57 × 0.4 = 0.23
M · momentum0.78 × 0.15 = 0.12
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.