Sublingual semaglutide being pitched to UK private clinics, Novo isnt happy
Posted by greg208 in Research & News - 1 points, 2 comments.
This one caught my eye. Apparently some outfit is marketing an unlicensed sublingual semaglutide to private doctors here in the UK as a "needle free" alternative to the injectable and the tablet. Novo Nordisk has come out against it, which isnt surprising given what it does to their market, but the safety angle is the part that worries me more.
Not gonna lie, the whole compounded GLP-1 space feels like the wild west at the moment. Youve got telehealth firms, compounders adding B12 or glycine to skirt rules, fake pens getting pulled by the MHRA, and now a sublingual version nobody really knows the pharmacokinetics of being pushed to clinicians who may not have the full picture. Even if the active ingredient is legit, the delivery route changes absorption in ways that arent properly characterised.
How are people here actually vetting the supply chain on these things? Because it feels like the regulatory gap is widening faster than the enforcement.
Comments
- grinder265: Ngl the sublingual angle is what gets me. Semaglutide has like a 1% oral bioavailability in the actual Rybelsus formulation, and thats with a specific absorption enhancer (SNAC) engineered into it. Just dropping the peptide under the tongue and hoping for the same exposure doesnt make a ton of sense to me. The compounding scene here is sketchy at best. Ive heard of clinics sourcing from places that cant even verify the API origin. The MHRA has been pulling stuff but it always feels reactive. F
- greg208: Yeah the SNAC point is spot on and thats the bit that stuck out to me too. Rybelsus exists precisely because without that absorption enhancer oral semaglutide is basically a very expensive placebo, so why would a sublingual version without any equivalent tech be any different. Makes you wonder if the clinics pushing it actually understand the pharmacology or if theyre just chasing margins on something trendy. Not gonna lie I hadnt thought as far as CoAs until you mentioned it, what should those
Community discussion - research and educational context only. Not medical advice.