Are miracle drugs hiding in plain sight?

GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro have transformed the treatment of obesity as well as diabetes, help treat heart disease, kidney disease, sleep apnea, and maybe even Alzheimer’s. But they are far from the only medicine with more than one use. Aspirin, colchicine, minoxidil, and Viagra were all found to treat more conditions than expected, and about a third of drugs end up with a second approved use.

In this episode, Jacob and Saloni explore the idea of drug repurposing: taking a medicine made for one disease and finding it works against others. They trace how GLP-1 drugs emerged from an adorable Gila monster, why some drugs have multiple uses, why so many of those uses go untested, and how patents, competition, prizes, and platform trials shape whether we ever find them.

Hard Drugs is a podcast from Works in Progress about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen.

You can watch or listen on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts.

Chapters:

• (00:00) - Introduction
• (13:20) - The origins of GLP-1 drugs
• (46:07) - GLP-1s for everything?
• (01:03:33) - Promiscuous drugs
• (01:25:04) - Why isn't drug repurposing more common?
• (01:56:39) - How to fix the incentives

Click here to view the episode transcript.

Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/

Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ 

Acknowledgements:

• Aria Babu, editor at Works in Progress
• Graham Bessellieu, video editor
• Abhishaike Mahajan, cover art
• Atalanta Arden-Miller, art direction
• David Hackett, composer

Correction: Saloni misdescribed the mechanism of immortal time bias - it comes from the pre-prescription time being counted in the treatment group, not the control group.

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