Lilly presents safety data on obesity drug retatrutide, noting rare cardiac events

Eli Lilly reported new safety and tolerability findings for its next-generation obesity therapy retatrutide at the American Diabetes Association annual meeting.

In the study, 7 of the 403 participants receiving retatrutide experienced arrhythmias and three had major cardiovascular complications, while no such events were reported in the placebo group.

The data build on earlier late-stage results from the TRANSCEND-T2D-1 trial, which showed the compound helped people with diabetes lower blood sugar and achieve significant weight loss, a notable outcome because diabetic patients usually lose less weight.

Experts said the low number of cardiac events makes it difficult to draw firm conclusions, but the safety signals will be closely watched as the drug moves forward.