Weight-loss drugs could transform treatment for other major health conditions. Here’s what could be next

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US regulators on Friday authorized Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro to lessen the likelihood of heart attacks and strokes in high-risk type 2 diabetes patients. The decision marks the latest step by manufacturers of GLP-1 drugs to broaden the clinical scope of their treatments.

In 2024, Danish competitor Novo Nordisk earned Food and Drug Administration approval for its weight-loss medication, Wegovy, to curb cardiovascular risks among overweight or obese individuals without diabetes.

A look at other conditions targeted or being evaluated using these diabetes and weight-loss drugs follows below:

This marks the latest in a race by makers of GLP-1 medicines to expand their use (PA)

Alcohol addiction

A mid-stage study sponsored by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, involving 48 adults with alcohol use disorder, found that semaglutide — the main ingredient in Novo’s Ozempic and Wegovy — significantly reduced weekly alcohol craving relative to placebo.

Yale University began recruiting for a 10-patient study in March 2026 to evaluate semaglutide for alcohol use disorder in people who have undergone bariatric surgery and are overweight or have obesity. The early-stage study is expected to finish in October 2026.

Alzheimer’s disease

Novo Nordisk said in November 2025 that its older diabetes drug, Rybelsus, which is also based on semaglutide, failed to slow cognitive decline in early-stage Alzheimer’s patients in two trials, covering a combined 3,808 patients.

Novo said semaglutide improved some Alzheimer’s-related indicators, but the changes did not translate into a delay in disease progression as measured on a scale for assessing cognition and daily function. The company discontinued the planned one-year extension of the studies.

Cardiovascular disease

Eli Lilly tested tirzepatide — the main ingredient in Mounjaro and Zepbound — for patients with heart failure and obesity. Lilly had said it would enroll about 700 people in the study, but the company said last year that it has withdrawn its U.S. application for heart failure approval.

Novo won the FDA’s approval in 2024 to use Wegovy to reduce the risk of cardiovascular death, heart attack and stroke in overweight or obese adults without diabetes.

The European Medicines Agency backed the use of Novo’s semaglutide to help ease heart failure symptoms in people with obesity in September 2024.

In 2025, the FDA approved Rybelsus to reduce the risk of heart attack or stroke in diabetic patients.

Chronic kidney disease

Novo’s Ozempic is approved in the U.S. for reducing the risk of kidney failure and disease progression as well as the risk of death due to heart problems in diabetes patients with chronic kidney disease.

Lilly’s tirzepatide is being evaluated in a 140-participant mid-stage study of patients with chronic kidney disease and obesity. The study is expected to be completed in October.

Knee osteoarthritis

In Novo’s 407-patient late-stage trial, semaglutide reduced body weight and knee osteoarthritis pain more than placebo after 68 weeks and improved physical function in people with obesity and moderate knee osteoarthritis.

Lilly is recruiting for a trial of its oral GLP-1 medicine, Foundayo, in adults who have obesity or are overweight and have knee osteoarthritis.

Liver disease

Novo’s Wegovy was approved in the U.S. in August 2025 to treat adults with metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis, or MASH, based on results from the first part of its late-stage trial. Results from the second part, with about 1,200 patients, are expected in 2029.

Lilly’s tirzepatide helped up to 74% of patients achieve absence of MASH with no worsening of liver scarring at 52 weeks, compared with 13% of patients on placebo, in a mid-stage trial.

Lilly is running a late-stage study of tirzepatide and experimental drug retatrutide in about 4,500 people at high risk of serious liver-related complications from MASH. The study began in October 2025 and is scheduled to run until 2032.

Neurological disorders

Researchers at the Danish Headache Center tested semaglutide along with a very-low-calorie diet as a treatment for new-onset idiopathic intracranial hypertension, a condition associated with obesity in which blood pressure inside the head rises.

Sleep apnea

Zepbound was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for obstructive sleep apnea in December 2024, making it the first drug to directly treat patients with the common disorder that causes breathing disruption while sleeping.

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