By Xavier Martinez
For the first time in nearly three decades, new treatments may be on the way for the roughly 80 million Americans who are losing their hair.
Experimental drugs are showing promise after years of little innovation. Earlier this week, New Haven, Conn.-based Veradermics reported promising late-stage trial results for a new hair-loss pill that is being developed for men and women. It is the latest in a string of hopeful results from companies developing new hair-loss treatments.
"It is an exciting moment, truly, in hair therapeutics," said Dr. Song Park, a dermatologist at the University of Washington School of Medicine.
Hair loss is widespread: By age 35, two-thirds of American men and one-quarter of women will experience noticeable thinning, according to the American Hair Loss Association. These are people who have the most common form, known as "pattern" hair loss, which is caused by hormones that gradually shrink hair follicles until they stop producing hair altogether.
For decades, doctors have had two effective, yet imperfect, options to offer people who were losing their hair.
Finasteride, sold under the brand name Propecia, works by blocking the hormone that shrinks hair follicles. It can come with serious side effects such as depression, loss of libido and sexual dysfunction.
The other major drug, minoxidil, is sold over the counter as a foam or liquid requiring twice-daily application -- a time-consuming routine for many patients. A pill form of the drug exists but was never formally approved for hair loss and carries risk of heart failure at higher doses. Doctors do prescribe it off-label for hair loss at low doses.
Veradermics's drug is a new formulation of minoxidil. The pill is engineered for slow, steady absorption throughout the day rather than the rapid spikes that have been linked to cardiac risks.
Results from a clinical trial announced Monday showed patients on Veradermics's drug grew more than four times as much new hair as those on a placebo treatment -- with about 80% of patients reporting improvement within six months. The company said no one in the study suffered serious side effects from the medication.
If approved, Veradermics's pill would be the first new FDA-approved pill for pattern hair loss in nearly 30 years. The company is also testing the drug in women -- who currently have no approved pills for hair loss -- though that approval would require a separate regulatory process.
Citi analyst Geoff Meacham estimates the drug could generate $3 billion in peak annual sales by 2035, just for men alone.
"This is a population that is highly motivated but is deeply frustrated, " said Reid Waldman, Veradermics's chief executive officer and a dermatologist, who attributed the recent surge in hair-loss innovation partly to a cultural shift driven by GLP-1 weight-loss drugs, which showed patients will pay out of pocket for treatments they want.
Gustavo Nascimento is a prime target for new hair-loss drugs. He first started noticing his hair falling out in the shower when he was 17.
After months of online research, which included wading through warnings about finasteride's side effects, he started on a quarter dose of the drug at 19. Now 24 years old, he takes a stronger version of finasteride along with oral minoxidil at a low dose to stave off side effects.
He is cautiously optimistic about the new wave of drugs -- particularly Veradermics's pill, which he sees as a safer, more effective version of the oral minoxidil he already takes. But the Colorado Springs, Colo., resident stops short of calling this a revolution.
"I think there's some great stuff happening," Nascimento said. "But there's no 'cure' over the horizon."
Veradermics is one of a handful of companies looking to tap this market. In December, European-based Cosmo Pharmaceuticals reported results from a late-stage study of a serum that blocks the hormone driving hair loss directly at the scalp, without entering the bloodstream. The results showed patients on the drug grew between roughly two to six times more hair than those on placebo.
Kintor Pharmaceutical, a Chinese biotech, is developing a gel designed to destroy the protein that triggers hair loss at the follicle. U.S.-based Pelage Pharmaceuticals has an experimental therapy that tries to restart the hair-growth cycle from scratch by reawakening stem cells.
Write to Xavier Martinez at xavier.martinez@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 01, 2026 11:45 ET (15:45 GMT)
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