How Trump’s Greenland Demands Could Affect Ozempic’s Costs

President-elect Trump’s threat to impose tariffs on Denmark if it resists his plans to seize Greenland could disrupt one of America’s most popular exports: Ozempic.

Trump added Denmark to his growing list of tariff targets — including Canada, Mexico and China — as he increasingly talked about the US taking Greenland out of Denmark’s hands.

Danish multinational pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk is the sole owner of semaglutide, the active ingredient in both Ozempic and Wegovy. The monthly supply for Ozempic approaches $1,000 without insurance, although manufacturer coupons and patient assistance programs are available.

It is estimated that Novo Nordisk will be responsible for half of Denmark’s GDP growth in 2024.

According to census data available through November, pharmaceutical products accounted for approximately 30% of Danish imports coming through US ports in 2024.

A KFF poll last year found that 1 in 8 American adults said they had tried a GLP-1 drug like Ozempic, including nearly half of those with diabetes and a quarter of people with heart disease.

When reached for comment, a Novo Nordisk spokesperson did not directly address the tariff threat: “We will be monitoring the situation closely; we will continue to operate.” But we will not comment on assumptions and speculation. The geopolitical landscape of today’s world is very dynamic, and we remain focused on our commitment to delivering life-saving medicines to the patients we serve.

Medical supply chain experts had previously said that Trump’s proposed tariffs would likely lead to higher prices for imported medicines. However, there are many factors at play when it comes to access to semaglutide in the face of threats from the president-elect.

How serious is Trump?

The next administration will have broad authority to enact tariffs and will be able to structure them as it wishes. But some trade experts doubt that tariffs against Denmark will ever materialize.

“We don’t know if this current obsession with Greenland is generating distraction or something real,” said Lori Wallach, director of the Rethinking Trade Program at the American Economic Liberties Project.

“Even if there was something, it would need a legal basis to impose tariffs,” Wallach added. “And depending on the law he uses, and I’m having a hard time imagining what would work, it could take a while.”

But this would not be the first time Trump has imposed tariffs on European allies.

During his first term, Trump imposed tariffs on European steel and aluminum imports, claiming they threatened national security. Likewise, Trump has cited security concerns as a reason for his interest in Greenland. President Biden suspended these tariffs in 2021 as part of an agreement with the European Union.

“The things that are done in the name of national security have a broad scope. “While there may be immediate retaliation by the EU, there may be further actions taken in courts in the US and elsewhere,” Penny Nass, a senior researcher at the German Marshall Fund, told The Hill.

Given the popularity and demand for semaglutide products, as well as medical devices that also originate from Denmark such as hearing aids, Nass notes that there will be “tradeoffs” that the Trump administration will need to take into account when imposing tariffs against Denmark.

How specific is the tariff?

The White House can impose targeted tariffs at will.

Novo Nordisk is a multinational company with facilities around the world, including six in the United States. The company has a facility in Clayton, North Carolina, where it fills and packages most of the injectable obesity products used by patients in the United States.

Looking at the example of a jacket imported from Europe, Nass explained that definitions can be as precise as “the material it is made of, if it is for a man, a woman or for a child. It can be broken down even further if there is some sort of decoration on it. So, you can split the goods into A very granular level, and you can be very surgical and strategic.

According to Mark Hendrickson, director of supply chain policy at Premier Inc. To improve health care, tariffs can take into account many factors when it comes to imported pharmaceutical products.

“Are we just talking about the products that are actually coming from Denmark to the United States? Or, specifically, are we talking about the products that Novo has in this case? Where are they coming from? They have facilities all over the world, including Brazil,” Hendrickson said. : “China, France and then some local locations in the US as well.”

Regardless of how the tariff is ultimately structured, Hendrickson believes Novo Nordisk will need to rethink how it gets products into the United States, especially given the size of the market for the company.

There are international agreements that could also save Ozempic from being subject to tariffs.

The 1994 Agreement on Trade in Pharmaceutical Products under the World Trade Organization calls for the elimination of tariffs and customs duties on pharmaceutical products and materials used in their manufacture. The United States is among the signatory countries to this agreement.

The agreement was last updated in 2011 and includes more than 10,000 products.

Composite versions still exist

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) declared semaglutide in shortage more than two years ago, and in that time, compounding pharmacies have been able to sell compounded versions of the drug at much lower prices.

Although the FDA found Ozempic and Wegovy to be “available” in October, the agency has not yet removed these products from the drug shortage list.

When the FDA was reached for comment on when Ozempic and Wegovy might come off the shortage list, an FDA spokesperson said the agency “cannot provide a general timeline for when a drug might come off the shortage list because all drug shortages are… Evaluate it on a case-by-case basis. basis of the case.”

“The FDA continues to actively monitor drug availability and is currently working to determine whether demand or anticipated demand for semaglutide within the United States exceeds available supply,” they added.

Because compounded drugs are manufactured in the United States by compounding pharmacies, a tariff-induced rise in the price of Ozempic may prompt patients to turn to these local sources.