[HN Gopher] Novo Nordisk's Canadian Mistake
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Novo Nordisk's Canadian Mistake
Author : jbm
Score : 147 points
Date : 2025-10-19 20:39 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.science.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.science.org)
| paulpauper wrote:
| So would it be possible to buy the drug in Canada and ship to US?
| jasongill wrote:
| not legally, but anything is possible
| OutOfHere wrote:
| There is nothing illegal about it. People get medicines from
| abroad all the time that are not generic domestically. It's
| not a controlled substance. One might have to go through
| unofficial channels though. In fact, I know people
| domestically who already get it cheaply from elsewhere
| abroad.
| js2 wrote:
| > In most circumstances, it is illegal for individuals to
| import drugs or devices into the U.S. for personal use
| because these products purchased from other countries often
| have not been approved by the FDA for use and sale in the
| U.S.
|
| https://www.fda.gov/industry/import-basics/personal-
| importat...
| rootusrootus wrote:
| I think you may need to drive it across, not ship it, and the
| quantity limit is a 90 day supply. For people who live close
| enough to the border, it might be worth it.
| Hilift wrote:
| Possible, but considering that US Ozempic revenue is $10
| billion per year between only Medicaid and Medicare, that would
| attract customs attention. The US market was projected to
| increase to $58 billion by 2035.
| dlcarrier wrote:
| Smuggling aside, they generally won't make it through customs:
| https://www.help.cbp.gov/s/article/Article-1815?language=en_...
| pedalpete wrote:
| I thought I had a decent handle on patent law, but maybe I'm
| missing something here.
|
| Yes, the patent won't be valid for Canada, but you can't import a
| product into the US which would infringe on a US patent.
|
| So, though there may be a small amount that would slip through
| the cracks, it isn't as if anyone in the US can now manufacture
| Semaglutide and distribute it.
|
| Canada is such a small market, that many companies don't bother.
| Though, for the cost, it seems ridiculous a company as big as
| Novo didn't pay the $500...that may even have been in Canadian
| dollars. :)
| rootusrootus wrote:
| As Derek mentions, Canada is the second largest market. There
| may be a lot coming into the US already, legal or not.
| maximus_01 wrote:
| Not that small. High income and roughly the same population as
| California, which isn't too small for companies to bother
| selling into.
|
| Ozempic did about US$2bn of revenue in 2024 in Canada.
| killingtime74 wrote:
| Don't worry about the law think about the practical impact.
| It's now completely legal to ignore the patent in Canada so the
| price in Canada will plummet.
|
| Canadian pharmacies can legally sell it and Americans (and all
| other foreigners for that matter) traveling there can legally
| buy it.
|
| Unlike the criminal law, Novo nordisk would have to go after
| every single person individually and make the case that they
| are infringing the American patent. This is all without the
| help of the police or customs, as a private civil matter.
|
| Obviously this would be uneconomic for Novo Nordisk. You can't
| search anyone as you don't have any warrants, as it's not a
| crime and then even if you could, you need to prove that the
| drugs they have on them were purchased in Canada.
|
| Foreigners who currently pay a huge amount of money would only
| have to make one trip to Canada in however long period it takes
| for the drugs to expire. I know I would certainly make a day
| trip if I was using this drug.
|
| Intellectual property law firms offer services to renew and
| watch registrations like this worldwide and it would have been
| very simple to have a contract with one of them.
| tavavex wrote:
| > Canadian pharmacies can legally sell it and Americans (and
| all other foreigners for that matter) traveling there can
| legally buy it.
|
| Well, about that... Aren't all variants of medications like
| these prescription-only? And in Canada you can't fill a
| foreign prescription without having a local doctor sign off
| on it, as far as I know.
| digianarchist wrote:
| $450 CAD I believe.
|
| US consumers would have to travel to Canada for injections
| which isn't practical unless you live on a border town.
|
| It's unlikely to meet the bar for personal importation as you
| say.
|
| That probably won't stop people from trying. There's already a
| huge market for illegal compounds and GPL-1 drugs are available
| alongside the usual testosterone and other steroids.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| If you have a prescription from a provider in Canada, the
| limit for personal use is 90 days. As long as it is a legal
| drug in the US -- which I don't think necessarily includes
| that it's patented here, just that it's approved by the FDA.
|
| > There's already a huge market for illegal compounds and
| GPL-1 drugs are available alongside the usual testosterone
| and other steroids.
|
| The peptide and oils markets are both big, but largely
| separate -- the peptides folks don't seem to want to be
| associated with oils. Within peptides, GLP1s definitely
| dominate, though the other options are pretty popular. In my
| experience it seems like GLP1s are kind of a "gateway
| peptide" -- a lot of folks start with a GLP1 on the gray
| market, and then start to branch out and try the other
| options available.
| digianarchist wrote:
| You're probably right. I scanned the FDA website and wasn't
| sure how easy it would be to meet the requirements for
| personal medicine importation [0].
|
| As a Canadian national in the US I wouldn't even attempt
| doing this in the current political climate.
|
| [0] https://www.fda.gov/industry/import-basics/personal-
| importat...
| dawnerd wrote:
| Flights to Canada can be pretty cheap too. Less than the
| cost of one month so if you flew out every 90 days you'd
| still come out ahead. Practically not enough people will do
| this of course. Would be great for people in the border
| towns though.
| eek2121 wrote:
| I don't know about that, Canada is a beautiful country.
| If I were on the meds, I wouldn't hesitate to fly out for
| a day trip every 90 days.
|
| Also, let's be real, anyone in the northeast could be
| there in a few hours driving. New York City is about 7
| hours away from Ottawa, for example.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| We don't have laws anymore. Just pay off POTUS so he can
| declare cheap "fat shots" and let Kushner or Barron own the
| importer, and you're good.
| jzebedee wrote:
| > Prof. Michael Hoffman from Toronto put me on to the Canadian
| Patent Database, where you can find that Novo did file a patent
| there for semaglutide. . .but the last time they paid the annual
| maintenance fee on it was 2018!
|
| > You can even find a letter where their lawyers send a refund
| request for the 2017 maintenance fee ($250) because Novo
| apparently wanted some more time to see if they wanted to pay it.
|
| > On the same date in 2019, the office sent a letter saying that
| "The fee payable to maintain the rights accorded by the above
| patent was not received by the prescribed due date. . ."
|
| > By that time it was $450 with the late fee added, but that was
| apparently too much for Novo. They had a one year grace period to
| make it up, and apparently never did, so their patent lapsed in
| Canada. And as the Canadian authorities remind them, "Once a
| patent has lapsed it cannot be revived".
|
| Impressive failure for "the second-largest semaglutide market in
| the world."
| eulgro wrote:
| To be honest, given the efficiency of the drug and the huge
| benefit it could be to society, I feel like if I had been the
| employee in charge of filing patents I would've more than ready
| to lose my job in exchange for low cost general availability in
| the US via (illegal maybe, whatever) cross-border market. It's
| a nice loop hole and a great thing that once the delay expired
| they can't file ever again.
|
| One's got to find ways to feel like the good guy when working
| for Big Pharma . That's probably not what happened but it's
| nice imagining it.
| Vinnl wrote:
| Maybe they'd even do it in exchange for just low-cost general
| availability in Canada!
| 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
| I always wonder-in this case of such an epic company fuck up,
| does anyone ever get fired? Or is responsibility so diffuse
| that nobody is ultimately responsible?
|
| Pharma companies are really nothing more than holders of time-
| limited, expensive, exclusive IP. The number one priority
| should be to maintain those protections as long as possible.
| How could any patent be allowed to lapse, even if there was
| limited commercial value, let alone, a blockbuster drug making
| billions?
| ionwake wrote:
| after working in many companies for decades I can guarantee
| that the person responsible is some middle manager, who will
| just blame one of her/his workers who had that piece of work
| "deprioritised" to instead focus on the styling of a
| spreadsheet. The paper trail will point to the manager, who
| will just claim it was allocated to a problem character.
|
| The cartharsis comes in knowing that them firing the innocent
| just keeps them repeating the mistake.
| userbinator wrote:
| _Or is responsibility so diffuse that nobody is ultimately
| responsible?_
|
| That's exactly how things like this happen. No one has
| responsibility, thinking it's someone else's problem, so no
| one bothers to do the needful.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _thinking it 's someone else's problem, so no one bothers
| to do the needful_
|
| Or it's in someone's political interest to let the fuckup
| play out.
| bawolff wrote:
| Typically when people get fired for something like this they
| are just the scapegoat.
|
| A failure like this isn't just one dude forgetting, its a
| system failure where policies and checks failed. If it is
| solely up to one person that is a failure in and of itself.
| gpt5 wrote:
| Canadian manufacturers (Sandoz and Apotex) are preparing to
| launch their own generic versions in early 2026.
|
| I bet many Americans would travel to Canada to buy it there
| (despite the legality concerns). The medications lasts 2 years
| in a refrigerator.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| If you're going to go for a two year supply, it's probably
| better to just risk shipping it. You're not going to come
| home with that much without it getting confiscated, and
| you're way more likely to be searched individually than a
| typical package is.
| themafia wrote:
| You should be able to travel with a 90 day supply without
| issue.
| daniel_iversen wrote:
| Not an American but there's only very limited
| circumstances you can travel across the border home to
| the USA with foreign prescription drugs, right? And this
| scenario wouldn't cover it. Unless you just meant they
| won't get caught or maybe not fined or confiscated in
| practice? :)
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45638316
| valicord wrote:
| That's mainly for visitors. If you're a US resident, you
| can't just buy medicines abroad, unless of course we are
| talking about the "they won't get caught" scenario.
| c2h5oh wrote:
| With de minimis for US-bound packages suspended I suspect
| way more packages are inspected than used to be.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _With de minimis for US-bound packages suspended I
| suspect way more packages are inspected than used to be_
|
| But a smaller fraction.
|
| If you're paranoid, route it via the UAE. All my European
| and Indian shippers are doing that for tariff-free
| pricing. (Personal stuff. I'll pay a customs duty if I
| get it, of course.)
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Um, what are the legality concerns? Is it illegal to bring
| medicine for your own use over the border? If not that, then
| what?
|
| (Honest question. I don't know.)
| ano-ther wrote:
| https://www.fda.gov/industry/import-basics/personal-
| importat...
| jacobgorm wrote:
| Just don't do it in a speed boat.
| stevehawk wrote:
| the shelf life is probably longer than that if you buy it in
| dehydrated form and don't hydrate it (but i have no idea)
| ReptileMan wrote:
| So cocaine from the south, ozempic from the north, fetanyl
| from the west and the meth is homegrown. So USA just need
| some powder from europe to close the circle.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I totally believe this happened.
|
| If anyone has worked in a big, hidebound corporation, they are
| familiar with the "That's not my job" quandary.
| general1465 wrote:
| This is impressive feat of bean counting. To save few thousand
| dollars, they lost market of few billion dollars. Good job.
| bstsb wrote:
| looking at the filing, they had their patent deadline extended
| due to COVID-19 eighteen times!
|
| https://brevets-patents.ic.gc.ca/opic-cipo/cpd/eng/patent/26...
| choffman wrote:
| There's about to be a lot of skinny people in Canada bordering
| states. :)
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| AIUI, because they let the patent expire, the drug was not
| subject to price regulation by the government. So they could
| charge whatever.
|
| And during most of that time, they were still protected by 'data
| exclusivity' which means that any generic producer could not get
| approved without doing their own clinical trials, until 8 years
| had passed.
|
| So they gave up some period of exclusivity in return for being
| able to charge a higher price when they still had a monopoly.
| Emphere wrote:
| Thanks, can you point to where you found this info?
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| Sorry, pieced together from different sources.
|
| I am not an expert.
|
| Here's one about the price control on patented drugs:
| https://www.torys.com/our-latest-
| thinking/publications/2024/...
| malshe wrote:
| See the comments on that article where a few people have
| pointed this out.
| TMWNN wrote:
| Quoting myself <https://np.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/1md4wde/
| the_most_va...>:
|
| >Novo Nordisk did not file for a renewal because of a mistake, or
| someone going on vacation, or anything like that.
|
| >Novo Nordisk decided that the additional years of patent
| protection were not worth it compared to the advantage of the
| drug no longer being under the jurisdiction of the PMPRB <https:/
| /en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patented_Medicine_Prices_Revie...>.
| Whether that decision was financially correct in light of GLP-1's
| subsequent application to weight loss, I do not know. However,
| again, it was not a silly mistake on Novo Nordisk's part.
| 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
| I had never considered it-what makes a drug prescription vs OTC?
| Every substance has safety concerns(dose makes the poison), so
| with a lot of the financial gone, will the GLPs ever not require
| a prescription?
| dlcarrier wrote:
| In the US, prescription and OTC are theoretically completely
| unrelated, but in practice patent holders want their drugs to
| be prescription, where end users aren't involved in the process
| of selecting or paying for the drug, whereas generic
| manufacturers want the drugs to be OTC, where end users are
| choosing the product in a competitive market.
|
| See, for example, Prilosec (Omeprazole) switching from
| prescription to OTC.
| apike wrote:
| The FDA (or equivalent in the relevant country) regulates
| whether an approved drug requires a prescription based on the
| safety profile. To be approved for OTC, there is a much higher
| bar in terms of ease of misuse, side effects, and so on.
| vitorgrs wrote:
| In Brazil it will expire in July 2026. It's pretty relevant as
| it's kinda already announced they will put the generics on the
| public health care (SUS) for free... Which is big deal as an
| Ozempic shot costs almost the same as the minimum wage.
|
| This year they already did an analysis to include Ozempic, but it
| was denied, probably because of the cost difference...
|
| But they were trying on justice to extend the patent...
| glp1guide wrote:
| Not only that, there is a legitimate raft of companies lining up
| to make generics.
|
| There's one wrinkle though, legally importing prescription drugs
| from Canada isn't really allowed in the US/UK AFAIK. HIMS is
| probably feverishly figuring out how to do that right now.
|
| Shameless plug:
|
| https://glp1guide.substack.com/p/another-glp1-generic-launch...
|
| Also somewhat separately, injectable GLP1s are about to be
| upstaged by oral variants -- orfoglipron for Eli Lilly and the
| Wegovy Pill for Novo.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| _> Also somewhat separately, injectable GLP1s are about to be
| upstaged by oral variants -- orfoglipron for Eli Lilly and the
| Wegovy Pill for Novo._
|
| I believe that this gets a new patent, and will probably be a
| _huge_ seller.
| alister wrote:
| > _Interviewer at Endpoints: You plan to potentially launch a
| generic GLP-1 in Canada and Brazil in 2026._
|
| Looking at the original interview on Endpoints, Sandoz CEO
| Richard Saynor says this about Brazil:
|
| _In Brazil, the biggest prescribers are dentists. Everyone says,
| "Why dentists?" They do aesthetic work, and then you have your
| Botox, and then you want a bikini body. It's behaving like an OTC
| consumer brand. Imagine selling this, rather than $300, at $50.
| Anybody over the age of 40 in Brazil will probably want to be on
| that._
|
| But he doesn't explain how they got around the patents. Another
| comment on HN says they expire in July 2026, but can anyone
| explain why the patents expire so soon in Brazil?
| pogue wrote:
| It sounds like people will be flocking to Canada to fill their
| ozempic prescriptions. However, the WP just posted this article
| about how ordering rx meds from Canada has become unaffordable
| due to tariffs.
|
| _Many seniors get cheaper medicine from Canada. That might
| become harder_
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/10/18/deminimis...
|
| No paywall: https://archive.ph/nT0Jl
| tavavex wrote:
| The whole story seems utterly insane to me. The fact that Novo
| Nordisk went back to ask for a _refund_ of $250 they paid for the
| patent in 2017 shows that there was active intent behind this,
| this wasn 't just some internal disconnect between payment
| systems that prevented the money from being sent to the
| government. Who at NN thought that saving, what, ~$1000 total was
| justified for this? I thought companies of this scale didn't even
| think on the scale of thousands of dollars anymore.
|
| Oh well, at least we in Canada get more generic drug variants.
| Thanks!
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