French regulators have intensified their crackdown on the booming online trade in illicit weight-loss medicines, targeting platforms and sellers pushing unlicensed anti-obesity products.
The French Medicines Agency (ANSM) has taken further action against websites offering products marketed as anti-obesity treatments, following on from an initial swathe of measures taken to stop fraudulent, on-line practices.
In September, the drug regulator announced that it had identified 10 commercial websites illegally advertising and selling products presented as belonging to the "GLP-1 analogues" (aGLP-1) family of drugs used in the treatment of diabetes and/or obesity.
However, the drugs – marketed under the names Ozempic or Wegovy, Saxenda or Victoza, Trulicity or Mounjaro – mimic the action of the GLP-1 hormone that helps regulate blood sugar and appetite, can only be obtained from pharmacies upon the presentation of a prescription.
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Major platforms targetted
To put a stop to such illegal activities, ANSM has demanded that the products be removed from the platforms concerned and indicated that it had referred the matter to the public prosecutor and brought it to the attention of the French Interior Ministry's Pharos portal, where illegal content on the internet is reported.
Since then, some sites have removed the sales advertisements, the ANSM said in a statement on Wednesday, citing eBay, Cdiscount and Amazon.
However, for other websites, owned by Hamjouy Limited and Zongest Limited – two Hong Kong-based companies – the agency is taking "health policy measures to suspend the marketing, distribution, possession for sale, import, export, exploitation and advertising of fraudulent products".
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Rogue sellers and sham products
The ANSM has also warned that the actions "may be repeated for each new report of a website offering products for sale that are presented as medicines or with therapeutic claims", believing that the measures "will enable customs authorities to seize these illegal products".
The agency also revealed that it has carried out checks on certain patches sold on the internet that are presented as containing aGLP-1, but which in fact contain no slimming substances.
"These products are therefore fraudulent and could contain other substances that are harmful to health," warns the ANSM, which denounces the "misleading nature" reinforced by the presence of its logo and that of the European Medicines Agency on some of them.
(with newswires)
