The General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC) has apologised to patients with eating disorders who have been able to access weight loss drugs from online pharmacies despite not meeting the eligibility criteria.
It comes as an ITV News report this week (November 10) revealed that a woman with anorexia nervosa was able to purchase weight loss injections from a “well-known, respectable” online pharmacy.
“Despite being unhealthily underweight, she was able to buy the jabs online for a year,” it said.
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GPhC chief pharmacy officer Roz Gittins said in the broadcaster’s report that she is “really sorry” this happened to both the patient and her family, as well as “others who may have been similarly affected”.
The regulator is “really saddened to hear that these cases have occurred”, she added, stressing that it is “really important” ITV shares its findings with the GPhC so that it can “investigate” the claims.
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“There’s a lot of work we have already done to keep patients safe,” Gittins said, explaining that the regulator “routinely” inspects pharmacies across Great Britian.
But she noted that there is “more [the GPhC] would like to do”.
GPhC “very concerned”
In a statement on the GPhC website, Gittins added that the regulator is “very concerned to hear...that people with eating disorders have been able to obtain weight management medicines from online pharmacies”.
“Earlier this year, we updated our guidance to make clear that when supplying medicines used for weight management, the prescriber is expected to independently check the information provided by the person, including their weight, height and/or body mass index (BMI),” she said.
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Gittins also noted that the GPhC “will consider taking fitness-to-practise (FtP) action if pharmacists and pharmacy technicians may not be meeting [its] standards”.
“We continue to work closely with the other regulators that are also involved in regulating online prescribing services,” she added.
“They’re so easily accessible”
The ITV News report revealed that a woman diagnosed with anorexia four years ago was able to access weight loss injections online “for a year”.
“They’re so easily accessible, the first pharmacy that I used – it was online – it was quite a well-known, respectable pharmacy,” she told the broadcaster.
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“It was incredibly easy” to get the injections, she said, explaining that they were delivered to her house “the next day” and that the pharmacy didn’t “check any of [her] doctor’s details”.
ITV also revealed that it contacted the “major providers of eating disorder support” – a total of 24 groups with “multiple clinics” across the UK – and of the 14 that responded, almost 80% said that their eating disorder clients “have admitted using weight loss injections over the last year”.
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It comes after the GPhC issued new guidance in February, setting out that online pharmacies “cannot” prescribe based on online questionnaires alone and must “independently verify” patients’ weight and height before prescribing weight loss drugs.
But the Pharmacists’ Defence Association (PDA) warned at the time that the rules do “not go far enough to protect patients”.
And C+D revealed in March that the regulator received almost 50 concerns relating to weight management in just the first month of its updated guidance.
