Lawmakers are scrutinizing commercials from the telehealth company Hims & Hers, which promote injectable weight-loss drugs without disclosing important safety and risk details. The current advertisement, which airs during the lead-up to Super Bowl LIX, highlights the company’s ability to prescribe and dispense glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist medications. The ad boasts about the effectiveness of the drugs, showcasing an injection pen similar to a well-known brand-name product.
Last week, U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Sen. Roger Marshall, M.D. (R-Kan.) sent a letter to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) expressing concern over the commercial.
The letter notes that while the ad promotes GLP-1 medications, it fails to include necessary side effect warnings or safety information, which are typically required in pharmaceutical advertisements. The only mention of risks appears for a brief three seconds in small, hard-to-read text, which states that these products are not FDA-approved.
According to Sen. Durbin, the commercial may be exploiting a legal loophole surrounding the promotion of compounded drugs by telehealth companies. However, Durbin and Marshall argue that the advertisement still falls under FDA regulation.
The senators also stated that if necessary, they plan to introduce bipartisan legislation to close the regulatory gap and prevent patients from being misled by such ads. They believe the FDA may already have the authority to take action against misleading marketing practices.
