{"id":6844,"date":"2023-09-06T19:44:01","date_gmt":"2023-09-06T14:44:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/?p=6844"},"modified":"2023-09-06T19:44:03","modified_gmt":"2023-09-06T14:44:03","slug":"obesity-drugs-give-danish-economy-a-major-boost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/news\/obesity-drugs-give-danish-economy-a-major-boost\/","title":{"rendered":"Obesity drugs give Danish economy a major boost"},"content":{"rendered":"

Massive demand for diabetes and weight loss drugs made by Danish pharmaceutical group Novo Nordisk have turned it into Europe’s most valuable company, giving Denmark’s economy a major makeover.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“If it wasn’t for Novo Nordisk there wouldn’t have been any growth” in the first six months of the year, Danske Bank chief economist Las Olsen told AFP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company’s earnings have ballooned thanks to two in-demand prescription medications: type 2 diabetes drug Ozempic — made famous by US celebrities for its weight loss side effects — and obesity drug Wegovy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the first half of 2023, Denmark’s economy grew by 1.7 percent year-on-year, official data showed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Excluding the pharma industry, it shrank by 0.3 percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We’ve never seen anything like it, it’s changing the picture of the economy,” said Statistics Denmark analyst Jonas Petersen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Industrial production in Denmark “is up 40 percent compared to pre-pandemic levels,” noted Palle Sorensen, chief economist at Nykredit bank.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By comparison, “in the eurozone in general and in the US it’s pretty much at the same level as before the pandemic,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That “also means that the recovery from the pandemic has been stronger.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Novo Nordisk effect is seen in the state’s coffers — the company is the country’s biggest taxpayer — as well as in Denmark’s trade balance and employment figures.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Massive demand for diabetes and weight loss drugs made by Danish pharmaceutical group Novo Nordisk have turned it into Europe’s most valuable company, giving Denmark’s economy a major makeover. “If it wasn’t for Novo Nordisk there wouldn’t have been any growth” in the first six months of the year, Danske Bank chief economist Las Olsen […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":6845,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[396,2,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6844","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest","category-news","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6844"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6844"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6844\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6844"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6844"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en_gb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6844"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}