We have issued a warning to businesses and individuals who are targeting members of the public with ads for weight-loss prescription-only medicines. We have instructed them to remove their ads from online and social media.  

We have been taking action on this issue since 2021 when we issued a joint Enforcement Notice with the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). But we are aware through our own proactive monitoring that ads for these products continue to appear.  

Weight-loss drugs that are prescription-only medicines (POMs) should only be prescribed by a qualified medical professional. Reflecting this, the law and our advertising rules prohibit them being advertised directly or indirectly to the public. 

From paid-for online ads to social media and via influencers, various prescription-only medicines including for Ozempic, Wegovy (semaglutide), Saxenda (liraglutide) and products such as ‘skinny jabs’ and ‘flab jabs’, are being advertised against the rules.  

This is an area where there is a clear and significant risk of harm from irresponsible ads. We know that concerns about weight-loss can have negative impacts, including on the body confidence of both men and women. The decision to use weight-loss POMs is one which should only be undertaken after consultation with a medical professional and under appropriate medical supervision. None are approved for people who are not obese and, while most side effects for these medicines are mild, some may also be serious. Weight-loss POMs are not a cosmetic treatment to be used without serious consideration and advertisers should not be promoting them to the public.   

It’s why we are putting advertisers on notice. Our warning makes clear that anyone involved in creating and publishing ads for weight-loss POMs needs to get their house in order: understand and stick to the rules or face sanctions. 

As part of our clampdown, we’re using our world leading AI-based Active Ad Monitoring system to monitor weight loss POM ads at pace and scale. This will be supported by follow-up enforcement work.  

Our Active Ad Monitoring system has already enabled us to collect relevant ads across a range of online channels (including search and social) on an ongoing basis, leading to intelligence on the scale of the problem, priority channels and advertisers which has allowed our Compliance team to take action. 

Alongside our warning we’re committed to a rolling programme of monitoring, investigation, enforcement action and partnership working, including:  

• Launching formal proactive investigations as part of a project-based approach to identifying and tackling problems and setting clear precedents for advertisers  
• Working with online platforms to address the use of POM names in ads, including holding discussions with Google and Meta about preventing named POMs appearing in ads in the first instance, and having problem ads taken down 
• Capturing the ways advertising is evolving, including influencers offering discount codes or using generic phrases to indirectly promote prescription-only medicines as a means of evading detection and/or the rules   
• Intelligence sharing with regulatory partners and considering referrals of repeat/persistent offenders as necessary  

We are also focussed on helping advertisers stick to the rules and are writing to health and beauty practitioners, trade bodies, pharmacies, drug companies, advertisers and agencies to signpost our rules and the range of guidance and advice that is available to them. And we are partnering with MHRA and GPhC in cascading this information to stakeholders as well as working with the Influencer Marketing Trade Body to communicate to influencers about how and when the rules apply to them and where they can get help.  

We will take strong action under our role and remit, as a UK regulator, to tackle weight-loss POM ads targeted at people in the UK.

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