Four adverts banned for promoting prescription-only weight loss pills

Summarised from 2 outlets · 4 reports · Updated 4 Nov, 00:32 · Archive

The Advertising Standards Authority has banned four adverts for promoting prescription-only weight loss pills to the public. Prescription-only medicines cannot be advertised to consumers in the UK.

Two of the banned ads came from Voy's 'The weight is over' campaign. One appeared on the side of a London bus in July and featured a hand holding a white pill alongside the headline 'The weight is over…Voy'. A second ad, shown on video-on-demand services in August, featured a pill alongside the wording 'Oral weight support' and 'It's kind of a small deal'. Both ads included smaller text referring to glucomannan, a food supplement.

The first oral GLP-1 tablet for weight management was licensed as a prescription-only medicine in June. The ASA found the imagery and wording in both Voy ads were likely to lead people to understand they were advertising the newly available oral Wegovy tablets rather than a food supplement. The watchdog said that references to glucomannan in small-print were not enough to change that impression. The video-on-demand ad also directed people to a website featuring prescription-only weight-loss medicines.

The ASA also banned ads by Juniper and MedExpress for promoting oral weight-loss prescription-only medicines without naming them directly. A YouTube ad for Juniper stated 'The weight loss pill is here', while an Instagram ad for MedExpress promoted 'New weight loss tablets', 'No needles' and invited people to 'Join the waitlist'. These rulings follow an earlier ban last month on ads by Simple Online Pharmacy and Pharmacy Online, which had promoted oral GLP-1 treatments through social media and websites.

Catherine Drewett, investigations manager at the ASA, said the rulings make clear that 'advertisers need to consider the overall impression their ads create'.

Four adverts banned for promoting prescription-only weight loss pills — Image: Evening Standard

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How it is being reported

London bus advert among four banned for promoting prescription weight-loss pillsThe ads have been spotted on the sides of buses in London as part of Voy’s “The weight is over campaign”Evening Standard · 4 Nov, 00:01
Four weight loss adverts banned: ‘We won’t hesitate to take action’The ruling by the Advertising Standards Authority relates to the promotion of prescription-only weight loss pills to the publicThe Independent · 4 Nov, 00:01
Adverts promoting prescription-only weight loss pills to public are bannedThe ads for Voy, Juniper and MedExpress all promoted prescription-only medicines to the public, which is banned in the UK, the ASA found.Evening Standard · 4 Nov, 00:01
Adverts promoting prescription-only weight loss pills to public are bannedThe ads for Voy, Juniper and MedExpress all promoted prescription-only medicines to the public, which is banned in the UK, the ASA found.Independent Business · 4 Nov, 00:01

In this story: Advertising Standards Authority · Voy · Juniper · MedExpress · Wegovy · Simple Online Pharmacy · Pharmacy Online

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