+ A fight over ads could reshape the rivalry.

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The Daily Docket

The Daily Docket

A newsletter by Reuters and Westlaw

By Caitlin Tremblay

Good morning. Let’s kick off the new week with a look at the latest courtroom showdown between obesity drug giants. Plus, two small businesses challenged President Trump’s latest round of tariffs; and former SCOTUS advocate Tom Goldstein got six years in prison. Scientists found a planetary system so starkly dissimilar to our own solar system that they are struggling to find the proper terminology to describe it … which feels very Monday-coded. Hope you had a nice weekend. Let’s dive in.

Novo Nordisk pursues preliminary injunction to block Eli Lilly weight-loss drug ads

 

REUTERS/Hollie Adams/Brendan McDermid/Combination/File Photo

Novo Nordisk is asking a U.S. court to immediately block certain Eli Lilly advertisements for obesity drug Zepbound and diabetes treatment Mounjaro, escalating the fight between the two companies dominating the weight-loss market.

What does the lawsuit claim?

  • According to the lawsuit, Lilly compares the highest approved doses of Zepbound and Mounjaro with lower doses of Novo's Wegovy and Ozempic. Read the complaint here.
  • Novo argues the ads omit newer, higher-dose versions of its drugs, creating a misleading picture of how the treatments compare.
  • Novo is seeking a preliminary injunction to halt the ads while the case proceeds, as well as a permanent injunction and corrective advertising.
  • Lilly denies wrongdoing and says Novo has never directly tested its highest-dose products against Lilly's medicines in a clinical trial.

Why it matters:

  • The case pits the two biggest players in the obesity-drug market against each other as they compete for a market expected to exceed $100 billion by 2030.
  • It could test how aggressively drugmakers can use comparative efficacy claims in advertising when different doses and newer formulations are involved.
  • The injunction request raises the stakes: a ruling could force changes to a major pharmaceutical marketing campaign before the case is fully resolved.
  • More broadly, the dispute shows that competition in the obesity-drug boom is increasingly being fought not just through research and development, but also in the courtroom.
 
 

Coming up today

  • Employment: U.S. District Judge Patti Saris in Boston will hold a scheduling conference in a lawsuit by one of the largest U.S. labor unions challenging a move by the Trump administration to revoke security clearances that had been granted to thousands of noncitizen workers at airports nationwide. 
  • Gaming: Casinos, Native American tribes, sportsbooks, prediction market platforms, academics, consumer advocates and others face a deadline to comment on the CFTC’s June draft regulations governing the burgeoning prediction markets industry.

Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes.

 

More top news

  • Appeals court rejects Trump bid to halt $100,000 H-1B visa fee ruling
  • U.S. appeals court rules Trump cannot implement mail-in voting order
  • ICC members dismiss prosecutor Karim Khan, diplomatic sources say
  • Alex Saab, ally of Venezuela's Maduro, pleads not guilty to U.S. charges
 

"There is no question that I have deeply disappointed people, that I have not held myself to the standards that I should be held to, as somebody who's a lawyer and a prominent lawyer."

—Former U.S. Supreme Court advocate Tom Goldstein during his sentencing hearing on Friday. U.S. District Judge Lydia Griggsby in Maryland sentenced Goldstein to six years in federal prison for tax and financial crimes tied to his side career as a high-stakes poker player. Goldstein has said he will appeal to the 4th Circuit. 

 

In the courts

  • Tariffs: Two small businesses challenged President Trump’s latest round of tariffs on goods from 60 trading partners, saying that the new policy, like most of Trump's previous tariffs, went beyond the president's authority to tax imports.
  • Online safety: A divided 5th Circuit blocked Texas from enforcing a key provision of a state law meant to shield children from harm through using social media. Read the decision.
  • Shareholder: U.S. District Judge ‌Steven ⁠Seeger in Chicago dismissed a ‌lawsuit accusing Abbott Laboratories of defrauding shareholders in connection with a ⁠2022 recall of powdered infant formula, and lying about its commitment to quality and product safety. 
  • Abortion: U.S. District Judge Robert Ballou in Virginia ruled that it was illegal for the Biden administration to ⁠require doctors and pharmacies to be specially certified to prescribe the abortion drug mifepristone. Ballou said federal law permitted him to order the FDA, which is currently conducting ⁠a broader review of the safety of mifepristone, to reconsider ⁠the rule, but not to strike it down. 
 

Attorney Analysis