Eli Lilly reported more results Thursday showing that its next-generation obesity drug is highly efficacious at weight loss, but the data from the study, focused on people with heart disease, aren’t enough to answer a critical question about the therapy — whether it reduces cardiovascular risk.
The Phase 3 study enrolled nearly 2,000 people with severe obesity and heart disease, with or without diabetes. Those on the highest dose of the drug, called retatrutide, lost 22.6% of their weight after 80 weeks, while those on placebo lost 3.2%, when analyzing only the participants who stayed on treatment.
However, on pre-specified analyses that looked at the occurrence of major cardiovascular events such as death, heart attack, or stroke, those taking retatrutide did not have a statistically significant lower risk of major events than those on placebo. Lilly said the trial was not powered to study cardiovascular outcomes and there were fewer heart events than anticipated.