A Colorado overview of physician-supervised GLP-1 treatment through Astra, including local access context and the cities we cover. Every statistic on this page links to its source.
25.0% of Colorado adults have obesity (CDC BRFSS, 2024) 1 — the lowest adult obesity rate of any U.S. state that year, and the only state under 26%, confirmed by querying all 50 states plus DC in the same dataset (DC came in at 25.5%, higher than Colorado) 1. The national rate was 33.1% 1.
Roughly 1,161,711 Colorado adults still sit in that group. That figure is modelled — population × a 0.78 national adult-share assumption × the prevalence rate, a pack-wide convention, not an independently published Census or CDC number 12.
We do not have a verified answer, and we are not going to write one. Health First Colorado's (Colorado Medicaid's) specific prior-authorization policy for GLP-1s and weight loss could not be verified in this research pass.
The document initially cited as Colorado's Preferred Drug List — hcpf.colorado.gov's own production URL — was confirmed on direct download and full-text extraction to be Alaska's Preferred Drug List: wrong state, wrong document, only 47 pages total (the cited pp.74-76 do not exist), zero mentions of GLP-1, weight loss, obesity, Wegovy, Zepbound, or Saxenda anywhere in it. Every other hcpf.colorado.gov page (PDL landing page, pharmacy-benefits, sitemap, robots.txt) returned a 403 block to automated access, so no alternative primary source was reachable in this pass.
This is a data gap, not a guess: this page publishes no specific claim about Colorado's GLP-1 Medicaid coverage, prior-authorization criteria, carve-outs, or effective dates until it is re-sourced from a verified, working HCPF page or confirmed directly with HCPF. To check current policy directly, go to hcpf.colorado.gov/pharmacy-resources — that link is a pointer for you to follow, not a citation substantiating anything above.
Our price in Colorado is the same as our price everywhere else.
Astra's pricing is the same in every state we serve: compounded semaglutide from $68 per month and compounded tirzepatide from $118 per month on 12-month plans, or $145 and $250 per month when billed monthly. There is no local price list, no regional surcharge, and no state-specific discount.
Colorado's uninsured rate is 7.9% and median household income is $97,113 (Census Reporter / ACS 2024 1-year estimates) 3. There is no local price comparison on this page: no verified Colorado clinic pricing exists to compare against, and state hubs do not carry price tables.
Prescriber licensing in Colorado runs through the Colorado Division of Professions and Occupations (DORA), which houses the Colorado Medical Board and the State Board of Pharmacy.
TODO — unverified in this research pass. No Colorado-specific telehealth-prescribing or compounding rule was researched for this page, so none is asserted here.
What is settled is federal, not state-specific: the FDA ended the tirzepatide shortage on December 19, 2024 and the semaglutide shortage on February 21, 2025, and a compounded copy of an FDA-approved GLP-1 is lawful only for an individual patient with a prescriber-documented, clinically significant difference from the approved product.
Astra is licensed to treat patients in Colorado, and in all 50 states. No waitlist, no availability check.
Astra treats patients in Colorado through state-licensed physicians.
More Colorado cities — coming soon. Colorado Springs, Fort Collins, and Greeley pages are in research; CDC PLACES city-level figures exist for all three but use a different methodology and survey year than the state number above, so they are not published here as comparable [4].
Colorado's adult obesity rate was 25.0% in 2024 (CDC BRFSS) -- the lowest of any U.S. state, and the only one under 26%, against a 33.1% national rate. That's a real, sourced ranking, not an Astra claim about why; we haven't researched the causes and won't speculate. It also doesn't mean obesity is rare here -- CDC's own modelling puts more than a million Colorado adults in that group.
We looked for Health First Colorado's specific GLP-1 weight-loss policy and could not confirm it from a working primary source. The document we found cited as Colorado's Preferred Drug List turned out, on direct verification, to be Alaska's -- wrong state's document -- and Colorado's own site blocked every other access attempt we made. Rather than guess, we're flagging this as unconfirmed: check hcpf.colorado.gov's Pharmacy Resources page or contact Health First Colorado directly for current prior-authorization criteria.
No -- Astra's price is the same nationwide: $68/month for semaglutide and $118/month for tirzepatide, both on 12-month plans, the same price at every dose. We're a telehealth provider, not a local clinic, so there's no Colorado markup and no Colorado discount. We say this plainly because most competitors' state pages imply otherwise.
Colorado's specific telehealth-prescribing statute and board rule have not yet been verified for this page [TODO -- fill in once confirmed]. In general, states in this pack allow licensed providers to evaluate patients and prescribe non-controlled medications like semaglutide and tirzepatide through telehealth without a mandatory in-person visit, provided the visit meets the same standard of care as an in-person exam -- but Colorado's exact rule needs its own citation before this page asserts that specifically.
Possibly, but only under narrow federal conditions, and this hasn't yet been checked against Colorado-specific board rules [TODO]. Since the FDA declared the tirzepatide and semaglutide shortages resolved (Dec 19, 2024 and Feb 21, 2025), a compounding pharmacy may generally dispense a compounded version of an FDA-approved GLP-1 only for an individual patient whose prescriber has determined and documented a clinically significant difference from the approved product (FDA Section 503A). Whether that applies to you is a decision for a licensed provider.
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Educational information, not medical advice. Treatment requires evaluation by a licensed physician.