Obesity: Drugs
(asked on 21st July 2025) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 21 July 2025 to Question 67568 on Obesity: Drugs, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that private online clinics prescribing weight loss drugs are compliant with (a) Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and (b) General Medical Council guidance.
The safest way to access medicines privately is to do so via a United Kingdom-registered prescriber and pharmacy, whether in-person or online. All UK prescribers, whether employed privately or by the National Health Service, are expected to take account of appropriate national guidance, and are regulated by UK regulators. Using UK-registered pharmacies also means that the medicines received will meet UK standards of safety and efficacy. The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has reminded prescribers to explain the possible side effects of these medicines, and the risks around falsified products.
Any UK prescriber operating in a private capacity must be a healthcare professional who is regulated by a professional regulator such as the General Medical Council (GMC) for doctors, or the General Pharmaceutical Council or Pharmaceutical Society of Northern Ireland, for pharmacists.
When prescribing, doctors are expected to follow the GMC’s Good practice in proposing, prescribing, providing and managing medicines and devices, which refers to guidance from the MHRA. The General Pharmaceutical Council has strengthened safeguards for online pharmacies, including the need for extra checks to verify eligibility for obesity medicines. Guidance for registered pharmacies providing pharmacy services at a distance, including on the internet, is available at the following link:
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of health and social care providers in England. Private online clinics that prescribe weight loss medicines need to register with the CQC for the regulated activity of Treatment of Disease, Disorder or Injury as set out by the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014.
The CQC can take regulatory or enforcement action where they find fundamental standards have been breached.