Such is the popularity of the revolutionary weekly appetite suppressant lauded by Elon Musk and Kim Kardashian that the company has become the most valuable in Europe.

The company also produces Ozempic, a closely linked diabetes treatment that can be prescribed as a weight loss treatment.

Novo Nordisk’s revenue jumped by a quarter last year to 175 billion Danish krone ($A39bn) driven largely by sales of Wegovy.

Denmark’s national bank has said that if it were not for the fortunes of Novo Nordisk, the country would be in recession.

The company is worth almost $A670bn and is now more valuable than the entire Danish economy combined.

Novo Nordisk was founded by Nobel-winning physiologist August Krogh and was the first company to sell insulin in Scandinavia.

It made a successful business supplying insulin but its recent fortunes are down to Wegovy which has been found to help patients lose up to 12 per cent of their body weight.

It works by mimicking a gut hormone that tricks the brain into feeling full.

“There are other big companies in Denmark and they are also important but we have not had something as big as this and we have not had something growing as fast as this,” Las Olsen, chief economist at Danske Bank, told Britain’s Daily Telegraph.

“Novo Nordisk is by far the biggest taxpayer in Denmark and that’s only increasing.

“For the last year, if it hadn’t been for this growth, actually there would have been a contraction in Danish GDP.”