The millennial-skewed telehealth platform Hims & Hers announced Monday that is now offering customers a compounded version of semaglutide, the active ingredient in popular weight loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy.
Customers will be able to get a prescription for the drug from a licensed health care provider directly on the platform. A month’s supply of the weight loss medication will start at $199 — hundreds of dollars cheaper than Ozempic’s nearly $1,000 list price and Wegovy’s $1,349 price tag.
The company’s shares soared over 30% during Monday trading following the news.
The announcement comes as skyrocketing demand for GLP-1 medications, the class of drugs that Ozempic, Wegovy and Eli Lilly’s Zepbound belong to, has made them harder to access. An Eli Lilly executive told Quartz that it will take a GLP-1 pill to address current supply constraints.
When a medication is in shortage, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) allows drug manufacturers to make compounded, or altered, versions of the drug if they meet specific regulatory requirements. However, the agency does not review the safety and efficacy of these products.
In January, the FDA said it had received adverse reports from patients taking a compounded semaglutide and recommended that patients not use a compounded drug if an approved drug is available.
Hims & Hers was founded in 2017, known as just “Hims” at the time, as a platform for men to get prescriptions online for erectile dysfunction and hair loss medications. Since then, it has expanded to offer treatments for men and women to address skin care, anxiety, and overall sexual health.
In December, Hims & Hers launched a weight loss program that included access to non-GLP-1 weight loss medications. The company’s other weight loss medication offerings focus on treating the underlying causes of weight gain. In the company’s first quarterly earning report of 2024, it projected that its weight loss program will generate $100 million by the end of 2025.
In Monday’s announcement, Hims & Hers said that it also plans to offer branded GLP-1 drugs as supplies becomes more available.
This article originally appeared on Quartz.
