How Weight-Loss Drugs Are Distorting the Danish Economy

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Huge growth for manufacturer Novo Nordisk is creating complications for Denmark.

By Cameron Abadi, a deputy editor at Foreign Policy, and Adam Tooze, a columnist at Foreign Policy and director of the European Institute at Columbia University. Sign up for Adam’s Chartbook newsletter here.

This picture shows Ozempic medication boxes in a pharmacy in Riedisheim, France.

This picture shows Ozempic medication boxes in a pharmacy in Riedisheim, France, on Oct. 23, 2023. SEBASTIEN BOZON/AFP via Getty Images

Danish pharmaceutical manufacturer Novo Nordisk recently achieved a market valuation of roughly $500 billion, making it only the second European company to ever break that half-trillion-dollar market cap barrier—and also making its value larger than the GDP of Denmark, the country where it’s based. Novo Nordisk’s explosive growth has been driven by its manufacturing of diabetes and anti-obesity drugs, including Ozempic, which have seen surging demand around the world—and resulted in an influx of money into Denmark.

Cameron Abadi is a deputy editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @CameronAbadi

Adam Tooze is a columnist at Foreign Policy and a history professor and the director of the European Institute at Columbia University. He is the author of Chartbook, a newsletter on economics, geopolitics, and history. Twitter: @adam_tooze