The latest ad for Wegovy won’t stop anyone in their tracks. “Have you also had trouble with your weight?” a grinning actor says to the camera. “Same!” The blockbuster obesity medication sold by Novo Nordisk can lead to 15% weight loss, more actors claim. But as with many drug ads, more than a minute of its 90-second run time is monopolized by the less savory side of semaglutide: side effects like pancreas inflammation, gallbladder problems, diarrhea, and more.
By comparison, the Super Bowl ad for weight loss medications from direct-to-consumer telehealth company Hims & Hers released Tuesday is optimized to engage and infuriate. Over the refrain of Childish Gambino’s anti-racist anthem “This Is America,” its narrator makes the case that the weight loss industry, including drugmakers, are extracting profits from overweight and obese Americans without really helping them.
The multi-million dollar ad’s message isn’t bogged down by the same litany of disclaimers as Wegovy’s — even though it promotes a compounded version of the same class of medication, known as GLP-1s, as part of its solution to the broken health care system. It’s a paradox of pharmaceutical marketing that has left some health policy and pharmacy experts concerned that patients, increasingly exposed to compounded medication ads from companies like Hims & Hers, will confuse and mislead patients seeking out obesity care.
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