St. Paul – Minnesota legislators delayed action on a bill that would block Medicaid coverage for prescription medications used solely for weight loss.
The bill authored by Rep. Danny Nadeau, R-Rogers, aims to ban the state’s Medical Assistance program from covering drugs known as GLP-1s if patients use them exclusively for weight loss.
GLP-1s such as Ozempic and Mounjaro were originally developed to treat Type 2 diabetes but became popular for their highly effective weight loss side effects. Currently, many GLP-1s such as Wegovy, produced by the same company that produces Ozempic, are marketed specifically for weight loss.
As of January of this year, 13 states, including Minnesota, covered weight loss medications for obesity treatments through Medicaid, according to Kaiser’s 2025 Medicaid budget survey.
Despite concerns about obesity as a global health crisis, Nadeau said his top priority is managing state spending.
“My bill is not about discussing whether or not obesity is a chronic disease and a condition that needs to be treated,” Nadeau said. “It’s about balancing, or trying to balance, the cost of our health care system with the trend of dramatically increasing costs for certain drugs.”
Legislation mandating obesity treatment coverage was first introduced in Minnesota in 2024 and has been reintroduced in the next two sessions. This year, bills in the House and Senate seek to require health plans to cover obesity treatment, including GLP-1s.
The Minnesota Board of Health Plans reports a sharp increase in the use of GLP-1 for weight loss based on Medicaid trends in 2024.
By April 2025, the average annual cost of GLP-1 treatment for one person will be $12,000, the board said. These costs make up more than 12% of Minnesota pharmaceutical costs.
Medical costs in the form of pharmaceutical costs will increase by 24% in the country in 2024.
Doctors, obesity experts and advocates for diabetes treatment spoke at a committee hearing on March 25 to challenge Nadeau’s bill, saying that state spending on obesity management is cost-effective in the long run.
Matt Prokop, director of state government affairs for the American Diabetes Association, said obesity and the medical conditions that often accompany it, such as diabetes or high blood pressure, increase annual Medicaid spending by about $56 billion, citing a 2026 study from the ADA.
“Treating obesity early can prevent costly health complications and save the state money, especially in the most vulnerable populations like Minnesotans with Medicaid coverage,” Prokop said.
Dr. Claudia Fox, professor of pediatrics and co-director of the Center for Pediatric Obesity Medicine at the University of Minnesota, said that the treatment of obesity through weight loss medications is life-saving care.
Fox referred to the case of a 14-year-old, 270-pound patient who was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes and was at risk of early death from a stroke or heart attack. After nine months of taking Wegovy, the patient lost 57 pounds and his diabetes tests were normal.
When his insurance plan changed and he could no longer afford weight loss medication, the patient regained 23 pounds in three months.
“Declining obesity treatment is a parity issue,” Fox said. “To treat obesity as a vanity problem or a mistake ignores decades of scientific evidence.”
The bill was kept over for possible consideration in a larger bill later in the process.
Report for Minnesota is a project of the University of Minnesota’s Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication to support local news across the state.
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