As GLP-1 receptor agonists (RAs) such as Wegovy or Ozempic (semaglutide) become more widely used for weight loss, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) and the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) are taking regulatory action against inappropriate prescribing and advertising.

Healthcare practitioners have already been disciplined for prescribing or supplying weight-loss injectables to patients with disordered eating, a spokesperson for AHPRA told Medscape News Australia. “This [discipline] has included the imposition of conditions on their registration and issuing formal cautions,” said the spokesperson.

Some of the issues with prescribing GLP-1 RAs, which AHPRA continues to be notified about, include inadequate assessment, poor communication with other treating practitioners, and insufficient follow-up, the AHPRA spokesperson said.

AHPRA is concerned that some healthcare practitioners “may be failing to meet the standards of good practice” by working for healthcare services that provide “access to a predetermined medicine,” said the spokesperson. “This [practice] poses risks to patient safety that have the potential to cause significant harm.”

Dietitians are increasingly hearing that patients with complex relationships with food and body image are being prescribed GLP-1 RAs, Fiona Willer, AdvAPD, PhD, president of Dietitians Australia, told Medscape News Australia.

“Sometimes they’re even pitched to them as a solution to their issues,” she said. “I’ve heard about long-recovered eating disorders reemerging with a vengeance. Anecdotally, we hear about people who have acquired the GLP-1 from a telehealth pill mill bragging about not having had anything to eat for days. It’s the kind of worrying thing we see in pro-anorexia social media groups. Very dangerous.”

Advertising Crackdown

The TGA requested the removal of more than 3000 online ads that included weight-loss therapeutic goods in the 2024-2025 financial year and gave 10 infringement notices for the alleged unlawful advertising of prescription-only weight-loss medicines in September 2025. The TGA also issued social media guidelines in November 2025, partly in response to the unlawful advertising of prescription-only drugs such as Ozempic.

“There are concerning parallels between how these drugs are being marketed and the long-standing, often unscrupulous commercial weight-loss industry,” said Willer. Prescription weight-loss drugs “are powerful medications with real risks, not lifestyle products,” she said. “Pharmaceutical companies and medical providers should be held to a much higher standard than the broader weight-loss marketplace.”

GLP-1 RAs suppress appetite by mimicking the natural hormone GLP-1, which regulates digestion and hunger. Patients taking GLP-1 RAs reduce their total caloric intake by as much as 39%.

“If the only outcome we’re chasing is kilograms lost, that can be mistakenly framed as success,” said Willer. “But nutritionally, this level of intake is extremely concerning. Inadequate nutrition increases the risk of muscle wasting, loss of bone density, and osteoporosis, and people can end up physically weaker and more vulnerable than when they started.”

Weight-Loss Ad Explosion

It’s against the law to market prescription medications directly to consumers in Australia, so some weight-loss services rely on a workaround; they allude to medical options or encourage people to speak to a doctor about their weight but do not name specific drugs.

Telehealth providers such as Juniper, Pilot, Moshy, and hub.health hint on their websites that a medication is part of their weight-loss service. Some offer patients a quick eligibility check, a virtual doctor consultation, and drug delivery as a package deal.

Eucalyptus, the umbrella company that runs Juniper and Pilot, recently faced scrutiny in the media for advertising discounted medical weight-loss services as part of a Black Friday sale. This kind of large-scale marketing campaign can reach vulnerable patients with eating disorders and should be regulated more heavily, Jane Rowan, the head of Eating Disorders Families Australia, told ABC News.

Meanwhile, Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk — pharmaceutical companies that manufacture GLP-1 RAs — have come under fire for their ad campaigns that raise awareness of weight as a health issue. Willer labeled these campaigns “unethical” in an interview with ABC News in October 2025.

“Ads like the Eli Lilly ‘We won’t weight’ campaign give the impression that this is a magic, effortless solution to weight gain,” Barbara Mintzes, PhD, professor of evidence-based pharmaceutical policy at the University of Sydney in Sydney, told Medscape News Australia.

GLP-1 RA manufacturers have also been behind a push to classify obesity as a disease rather than a risk factor. They have gained influence by making payments to Australian doctors via support for educational events, travel, and consultancies, said Mintzes.

“There are people who meet the BMI criteria for obesity and are also healthy, active, and vibrant,” said Mintzes. “The idea that they have a disease is presented by Eli Lilly as combatting stigma. But is this also creating more stigma in its own way, by representing obesity as a form of ill health?”

Aggressive advertising of GLP-1 RAs increases the risk for overprescribing, said Mintzes. Overprescribing can be dangerous for patients with eating disorders and can harm patients who experience the drugs’ side effects without meaningful health benefits.

GLP-1 RAs aren’t risk-free. They have been associated with an increased risk for suicidal ideation and suicide attempts. Researchers also have found a potential association between these medicines and increased risk for thyroid cancer.

Wegovy is likely to be added to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme soon for patients with cardiovascular disease and obesity, meaning that it will become cheaper to access for a subset of patients. But at present, all GLP-1 RAs used for weight loss in Australia are prescribed privately and cost patients thousands of dollars per year — and might need to be taken for life.

National Strategy Needed

Demand for GLP-1 RAs has surged, with up to 239,000 Australians accessing the drugs privately each month. This booming market caused Eucalyptus to double its annual revenue to almost $250 million last year.

“During the last few years, we have seen quite a growth in consumers being curious about and actively using GLP-1s for weight loss,” Jo Root, acting CEO of the Consumers Health Forum of Australia, which advocates for better healthcare, told Medscape News Australia.

“What this demand shows us is that there is an absolute need for Australia to have a national obesity strategy, which includes the role of GLP-1s and how consumers find out about them,” she added.

Australia’s health ministers met in December to discuss the National Obesity Strategy, among other agenda items, but regulating the promotion of medical weight loss was not discussed.

“We shouldn’t be leaving public health messaging to the people who are going to make a profit from it,” said Root. “We have seen a rise in social media influencers in this space doing paid sponsorships that sometimes aren’t disclosed, which is concerning and should not be allowed to continue.

“Advertising in this area of health is aggressive and stigmatizing to a vulnerable group. This shouldn’t be the standard we accept, and we want to see the government step in and become the custodian of reputable health information going to consumers about GLP-1s.”

Willer and Root reported having no relevant financial relationships. Mintzes reported being an expert witness on a legal case for the TGA.

Felicity Nelson is a freelance science journalist based in Sydney.