June 4 (Reuters) - Britain's medical costs regulator on

Tuesday recommended Eli Lilly's ( LLY ) weight-loss drug

Mounjaro for some patients with obesity and suggested not

placing a time limit on the medicine's use as it had for rival

Novo Nordisk's Wegovy.

Once approved, the draft recommendations from the National

Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) would provide a

roadmap under which Britain's National Health Service (NHS)

could offer Mounjaro as an alternative to Wegovy.

In its draft roadmap for Mounjaro, known chemically as

tirzepatide and sold in the U.S. for weight loss as Zepbound,

NICE said the drug could be used in patients with a body mass

index (BMI) of at least 35 and at least one weight-related

co-morbidity, such as type 2 diabetes or heart disease.

The regulator last year recommended Wegovy for the same

patient population but said it could only be taken "for a

maximum of two years" through the NHS's specialist weight

management scheme - matching the length patients were on the

drug in Novo's pivotal clinical trial.

NICE's committee found it "was not appropriate to include a

long-term stopping rule for tirzepatide," although it

recommended considering stopping treatment if patients lose less

than 5% of their initial weight after 6 months, according to the

document.

Lilly and Novo are vying to make their drugs more easily

accessible to patient populations globally as they ramp up

production to meet soaring demand and compete in a market that

many analysts now expect to reach $150 billion by the early

2030s.

Both Mounjaro and Wegovy are already available privately in

the UK for patients with a BMI of 30 or over and patients with a

BMI of 27 or more who also have another weight-related health

problem such as high blood pressure.

Outside the U.S., Lilly has launched Mounjaro for obesity in

Britain, Germany, Poland, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab

Emirates, according to the company.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration reported that two

doses of Mounjaro and Zepbound are now available that were

expected to be in limited supply through the second quarter of

this year.

NICE also recommended use of Mounjaro for patients with a

lower BMI from several ethnic backgrounds including Black

African and South Asian.

The regulator said it expected to finalize the roadmap on

Oct. 30 after a public comment period.