Most people meet GLP-1 medicines as weight-loss drugs. Their labels say more. This page reads the current FDA prescribing information for eight products — Wegovy, Zepbound, Ozempic, Mounjaro, Rybelsus and Ozempic tablets, Trulicity, Victoza, and Foundayo — from the manufacturers' DailyMed entries on 24 September 2026, and lists every approved use that is not weight loss itself, with the trial behind it.
A benefit on a label means FDA accepted a trial showing it, in a defined population. That is a narrower thing than "GLP-1s are good for the heart", and the population matters as much as the result. Nothing here suggests anyone should use a medicine for any of these purposes; that decision belongs with a prescriber.
The register
| Approved use | Products whose label carries it | Trial behind it |
|---|---|---|
| Blood-sugar control, type 2 diabetes | Ozempic, Mounjaro, Rybelsus / Ozempic tablets, Trulicity, Victoza | many; from age 10 for Mounjaro, Trulicity and Victoza |
| Weight management | Wegovy (from age 12), Zepbound, Foundayo | — the subject of the rest of this site |
| Fewer heart attacks, strokes and cardiovascular deaths | Wegovy, Ozempic, Rybelsus / Ozempic tablets, Trulicity, Victoza, Mounjaro | SELECT, SUSTAIN 6, SOUL, REWIND, LEADER, SURPASS-CVOT |
| Slower kidney decline, type 2 diabetes with chronic kidney disease | Ozempic | FLOW |
| Moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnoea, with obesity | Zepbound | SURMOUNT-OSA |
| MASH with F2–F3 liver fibrosis, no cirrhosis | Wegovy injection | ESSENCE (accelerated approval) |
Two things the register shows. Every non-weight benefit belongs to one product and one population, not to the class: Ozempic's kidney indication is not on Wegovy's label even though both are semaglutide, and Zepbound's sleep-apnoea indication is not on Mounjaro's. And Foundayo, the newest, carries weight management only.
The heart: six trials, counted per 100 people
Each label's cardiovascular indication rests on one trial. The "fewer per 100" column is our arithmetic — the placebo (or comparator) rate minus the drug rate — and it is the number that describes what the benefit looks like across a group.
| Trial (label) | Who was in it | Follow-up | Event rate: comparator → drug | Hazard ratio (95% CI) | Fewer per 100 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SELECT (Wegovy injection) | 17,604 with heart disease and overweight/obesity, no diabetes | median 41 months | 8.0% → 6.5% | 0.80 (0.72–0.90) | 1.5 |
| SUSTAIN 6 (Ozempic) | 3,297 with type 2 diabetes and high cardiovascular risk | median 2.1 years | 8.9% → 6.6% | 0.74 (0.58–0.95) | 2.3 |
| SOUL (semaglutide tablets) | 9,650 with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular or kidney disease | median 49 months | 13.8% → 12.0% | 0.86 (0.77–0.96) | 1.8 |
| REWIND (Trulicity) | 9,901 with type 2 diabetes, established disease or multiple risk factors | median 5.4 years | 13.4% → 12.0% | 0.88 (0.79–0.99) | 1.4 |
| LEADER (Victoza) | 9,340 with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease | — | 14.9% → 13.0% | 0.87 (0.78–0.97) | 1.9 |
| SURPASS-CVOT (Mounjaro) | 13,299 with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease | median 210 weeks | 13.0% → 12.1% vs dulaglutide | 0.92 (0.83–1.01) | 0.9 vs an active drug |
The event is the same composite in every row: cardiovascular death, non-fatal heart attack or non-fatal stroke.
What the table says, read plainly:
- The relative effect clusters between 12% and 26% fewer events. The absolute effect is roughly one to two fewer events per 100 people over two to five years. Both are real; they describe different things.
- SELECT is the only one in people without diabetes, and it is the trial behind Wegovy's indication — a heart benefit approved for people whose reason for treatment is weight and established heart disease.
- The benefit is not the same in every component. In SUSTAIN 6 the reduction came from non-fatal strokes and heart attacks, while cardiovascular death was 2.7% against 2.8%; in SOUL cardiovascular death was 6.2% against 6.6% (not significant). LEADER is the exception among these, with cardiovascular death 4.7% against 6.0% (hazard ratio 0.78).
- Mounjaro's trial had no placebo. It compared tirzepatide with dulaglutide — itself a drug with a heart indication — and the label states it was non-inferior and that superiority was not established. That is why its "fewer per 100" is against another treatment, not against nothing. Our Mounjaro side effects page sets out the trial.
The kidneys: one label, the largest absolute effect
Ozempic's third indication is to reduce the risk of sustained kidney-function decline, end-stage kidney disease and cardiovascular death in adults with type 2 diabetes and chronic kidney disease. It rests on FLOW (3,533 people, Ozempic 1 mg against placebo):
| Outcome | Placebo | Ozempic | Hazard ratio (95% CI) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kidney-and-cardiovascular composite (primary) | 23.2% | 18.7% | 0.76 (0.66–0.88) |
| Cardiovascular death | 9.6% | 7.0% | 0.71 (0.56–0.89) |
| Heart attack, stroke or cardiovascular death | 14.4% | 12.0% | 0.82 (0.68–0.98) |
| Death from any cause | 15.8% | 12.8% | 0.80 (0.67–0.95) |
| Kidney death | 0.3% | 0.3% | 0.97 (0.27–3.49) |
About 4.5 fewer primary events per 100 — the largest absolute difference among the outcome trials on this page, because people with diabetic kidney disease have many events to prevent. The label adds a limit worth stating: the benefit "was not evident in patients taking SGLT2 inhibitors at baseline, but there were few events in these patients". Our Ozempic side effects page covers the same label's safety record.
Sleep apnoea: Zepbound
Zepbound is approved to treat moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnoea in adults with obesity, from SURMOUNT-OSA — two 52-week trials, one in people not using a breathing machine (Study 5) and one in people who were (Study 6, machine paused for the measurement):
| At 52 weeks | Study 5: placebo | Study 5: Zepbound | Study 6: placebo | Study 6: Zepbound |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Change in breathing events per hour (AHI) | −5.3 | −25.3 | −5.5 | −29.3 |
| At least halved | 19.0% | 61.2% | 23.3% | 72.4% |
| Remission or mild, non-symptomatic | 15.9% | 42.2% | 14.3% | 50.2% |
Baseline was about 50 events an hour — severe. Roughly half reached the remission-or-mild threshold on the drug; half did not. How that sits beside weight loss, and what it means for breathing machines, is on our sleep apnoea page.
The liver: Wegovy and MASH, on a provisional basis
Wegovy injection is approved for MASH (metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis, formerly NASH) with moderate to advanced fibrosis, stages F2–F3, without cirrhosis. The evidence is ESSENCE, a 240-week trial whose week-72 liver biopsies from 800 patients support the approval:
| Week 72 biopsy | Placebo (n = 266) | Wegovy 2.4 mg (n = 534) |
|---|---|---|
| Steatohepatitis resolved, fibrosis not worse | 34% | 63% |
| Fibrosis improved at least one stage, steatohepatitis not worse | 22% | 37% |
This is an accelerated approval: it rests on what the biopsy shows, not yet on fewer cases of cirrhosis, liver failure or death. The label says continued approval "may be contingent upon the verification and description of clinical benefit in a confirmatory trial" — the rest of the 240 weeks. The same trial recorded fractures in 4.4% on Wegovy against 3.3% on placebo.
What no label claims
Searches for GLP-1 benefits turn up claims about addiction and alcohol, Alzheimer's disease and memory, polycystic ovary syndrome, fertility, arthritis and longevity. None of the eight labels read for this page carries an indication for any of them. Some are active research areas; research is not an approval, and a trial that has not been accepted by the regulator is not a label. Where the research stands:
- Cognition and dementia — our cognition page.
- PCOS — our PCOS page.
- Alcohol — our alcohol page.
- Long-term safety of taking them for years — our long-term side effects page.
What this page cannot tell you
- Whether a benefit applies to a particular person. Each result belongs to the population the trial enrolled.
- How the drugs compare with each other. Only SURPASS-CVOT compared two GLP-1 drugs directly; the rest are against placebo, and the labels say results across trials cannot be directly compared.
- The costs that come with the benefits. Each of these labels also carries its warnings, set out on our GLP-1 side effects page.
Anyone weighing a GLP-1 medicine for any of these reasons should take the question to a prescriber. How the class works is on our what is a GLP-1 page.
Sources
All prescribing information read from the manufacturers' DailyMed entries on 2026-09-24:
- WEGOVY, Novo Nordisk, effective 2026-06-18 — setid ee06186f-2aa3-4990-a760-757579d8f77b: sections 1, 6.1, 14.1 (SELECT, NCT03574597) and 14.4 (ESSENCE, NCT04822181).
- OZEMPIC injection, Novo Nordisk, effective 2026-06-01 — setid adec4fd2-6858-4c99-91d4-531f5f2a2d79: sections 1, 14.2 (SUSTAIN 6) and 14.3 (FLOW).
- RYBELSUS and OZEMPIC tablets, Novo Nordisk — setid 27f15fac-7d98-4114-a2ec-92494a91da98: sections 1 and 14.4 (SOUL, NCT03914326).
- ZEPBOUND, Eli Lilly, effective 2026-08-28 — setid 487cd7e7-434c-4925-99fa-aa80b1cc776b: sections 1 and 14 (SURMOUNT-OSA, NCT05412004, Table 9).
- MOUNJARO, Eli Lilly, effective 2026-08-27 — setid d2d7da5d-ad07-4228-955f-cf7e355c8cc0: sections 1 and 14.6 (SURPASS-CVOT).
- TRULICITY, Eli Lilly, effective 2026-06-16 — setid 463050bd-2b1c-40f5-b3c3-0a04bb433309: sections 1 and 14.5 (REWIND, NCT01394952).
- VICTOZA, Novo Nordisk, effective 2025-10-14 — setid 5a9ef4ea-c76a-4d34-a604-27c5b505f5a4: sections 1 and 14.3 (LEADER, NCT01179048).
- FOUNDAYO, Eli Lilly, effective 2026-07-29 — setid 8ac446c5-feba-474f-a103-23facb9b5c62: section 1.