WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 For the first time, federal health officials are taking aim at telehealth companies promoting unofficial versions of prescription drugs \u2014 including popular weight loss medications \u2014 as part of the Trump administration\u2019s crackdown on pharmaceutical advertising.<\/p>\n
The Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday posted more than 100 letters to various drug and online prescribing companies, including Hims & Hers, which has built a multibillion-dollar business centered around lower-cost versions of blockbuster obesity injections.<\/p>\n
The FDA warned the company to remove \u201cfalse and misleading\u201d promotional statements from its website, including language claiming that its customized products contain \u201cthe same active ingredient\u201d as FDA-approved drugs Wegovy and Ozempic. The formulations cited by regulators are produced by specialty compounding pharmacies and aren\u2019t reviewed by the FDA.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour claims imply that your products are the same as an FDA-approved product when they are not,\u201d states the warning letter, dated Sept. 9.<\/p>\n
San Francisco-based Hims said Tuesday that it \u201clooks forward to engaging with the FDA.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur website and our customer-facing materials note that compounded treatments are not approved or evaluated by the FDA,\u201d the company said in a statement.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the first FDA attempt to directly police online platforms like Hims, which have long argued they\u2019re not subject to traditional drug advertising rules.<\/p>\n
A memo signed by President Trump last week directed Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the FDA to ensure that pharmaceutical ads on TV, social media and other websites are \u201ctruthful and non-misleading.\u201d As part of the initiative, the FDA promised to send 100 letters to companies with deceptive ads.<\/p>\n
The new FDA letters each contain \u201ccease and desist\u201d language. That\u2019s a different approach for the agency, which typically drafts its letters in highly bureaucratic language citing specific FDA regulations.<\/p>\n
Hims has been under scrutiny from Washington for months.<\/p>\n
Earlier this year, a Super Bowl ad from the company touted the benefits of its weight-loss medications but didn\u2019t list any of their side effects or potential harms. FDA rules require advertisements to present a balanced picture of drug risks and benefits.<\/p>\n
Makary singled out the ad in last week\u2019s Journal of the American Medical Association, calling it a \u201cbrazen\u201d example of how advertising is \u201ccontributing to America\u2019s culture of overreliance on pharmaceuticals for health.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hims and similar companies initially sold cheap generic versions of drugs for hair loss, erectile dysfunction and other health issues. But booming demand for obesity medications opened the door to selling cheaper copies.<\/p>\n
The FDA permits so-called compounding, or customized production, when there is a shortage of the official versions of FDA-approved medications.<\/p>\n
FDA recently determined that the GLP-1 drugs no longer met the criteria for a shortage. That should have ended the compounding, but there is an exception: The practice is still permitted when a prescription is customized for the patient.<\/p>\n
Hims and other companies have taken to offering \u201cpersonalized\u201d dosages and formulations for certain patients, arguing they offer extra benefits.<\/p>\n
The letters posted Tuesday come from FDA\u2019s drug center.<\/p>\n
A letter posted last week from FDA\u2019s vaccine division took issue with a TV ad for AstraZeneca\u2019s FluMist vaccine, saying the spot\u2019s \u201cbackground music and visual distractions\u201d detract from information about side effects. The letter was signed by FDA vaccine chief Dr. Vinay Prasad, an ally of Kennedy who recently returned to his job at the agency after briefly being forced to step aside.<\/p>\n
Researchers and consumer advocates have long complained that the upbeat TV images of patients enjoying life with family and friends often overshadow discussions of side effects.<\/p>\n
Additionally, studies have shown that patients exposed to drug ads are more likely to ask their doctors about the medication, even if they don\u2019t fit the prescribing criteria. The American Medical Association, the nation\u2019s largest physician group, came out in support of a ban in 2015, citing TV advertising\u2019s role in \u201cinflating demand for new and more expensive drugs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 For the first time, federal health officials are taking aim at telehealth companies promoting unofficial…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":161502,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[28,793,3132,97,243,800],"class_list":{"0":"post-161501","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-general-news","10":"tag-government-regulations","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-medication","13":"tag-washington-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161501"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161501\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161502"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}