Wegovy May Reduce the Risk of Death From COVID-19, Study Suggests

People without diabetes taking Wegovy (semaglutide) for weight loss were less likely to die of COVID-19 during the pandemic, a large new study found.

Although the anti-obesity drug didn’t protect people from getting COVID-19, those on Wegovy were 33 percent less likely to die of the illness than those who took the placebo.

The findings were presented at the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) Conference 2024 in London and published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

“We were somewhat surprised,” says the lead author, Benjamin Scirica, MD, MPH, a professor of cardiovascular medicine at Harvard Medical School and the director of innovation in the cardiovascular division at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

The findings open up new avenues for exploring how this class of weight loss drugs may benefit people, says Dr. Scirica.