Wegovy pill? No thanks – I wouldn’t take it if you paid me – UK Times

The new daily Wegovy pill went on sale in the UK for the first time last week through pharmacies and online platforms, priced from £79 for new patients. Like the injections, the pills contain semaglutide and suppress appetite, but the tablets are being heralded as a game-changer and far more convenient than the injections, which are currently being used by more than 1.6m people in the UK – with adverts proclaiming “needle-free weight loss has arrived” as if we are coming out of the Dark Ages.

I just don’t understand the attraction. It might be cheaper than my jabs on paper – they cost £169 – but I wouldn’t take the pills if you paid me.

Rather than a two-second injection in my bathroom once a week, this is what taking weight-loss pills would look like: I’d wake up in the morning and Wegovy would have to be the first thing on my mind. That is after fasting for at least eight hours – so no sneaking into the kitchen for an apple in the night when my OAP golden retriever wakes me up by barking to go out – as the tablet has to be swallowed whole on an empty stomach.

The manufacturer recommends taking the pill as soon as you get out of bed for optimal absorption into your bloodstream. Semaglutide is damaged by stomach acid – and taking it orally means you need to follow an exact plan.

It’s this kind of strict regime which is off-putting to me. You can’t even have a cup of coffee first, which is the only thing that gets me moving in the mornings. Not only that, but you have to take it with no more than 120ml of plain water, so that means getting the measuring jug out until you’re sure you know how much water to fill your glass with and then waiting – yes, for 30 minutes – without eating or drinking anything at all, or taking any other medication.

Out goes my delicious Greek yoghurt and blueberry breakfast in the morning rush; I’m not sure a Wegovy pill would supply me with the same sustenance. I could wake up half an hour earlier, but honestly, it all sounds like way too much work. The obsessively strict routine is much more complicated than my current method – I microdose once a month by injecting myself as a maintenance step. And even when I was taking it regularly, I only needed a weekly jab of the pen rather than remembering it daily, which I could give myself at any time of the day, and I could eat as much as I wanted beforehand.

Yet for many the pill form is being seen as a magic bullet. In the US, 70 to 80 per cent of people who started taking Wegovy tablets this year had not previously used weight-loss injections, according to reports, which suggests that the oral version is going to be a blockbuster drug appealing to those who had been put off by the injections. Certainly, pharmacies are already seeing a surge of interest in the UK, according to the National Pharmacy Association (NPA).

Admittedly, I got over my needle phobia when I did IVF, which had been so bad I’d never even got my ears pieced, but I knew the Wegovy Flexipen needles were ultra short and fine – and delivered the medication into the subcutaneous fat layer, rather than the muscle, making the weekly injection pretty painless.

I will admit that it did feel strange getting my Wegovy pen out of the fridge from behind the carrots and jabbing myself in the tummy once a week in secret – because I felt shame at “cheating”.

But by the time I’d piled on the pounds after two pregnancies and been stress-eating while juggling life as a single mum and caring for my ailing dad, the GP told me my cholesterol levels were so high I’d need statins. I decided to get a private prescription of Wegovy in 2024 to lose the unhealthy 3st I’d put on: it worked over 18 months, at a total of £3042.

I followed the “Wegovy Wednesday” trend, taking my weekly dose mid-week so it kicked in for the weekend when temptation was more rife. How would this work in pill form? Well, it wouldn’t – and it rules out microdosing, which involves taking doses lower than standard FDA-approved guidelines – an “off-label” method I’ve used to reduce side effects, cut costs, and taper off dependence on the drug.

How to break a Wegovy pill in half, or quarters, to work out the dosage accurately would no doubt end up in crumbly bits. This would be fine if it were aspirin, but difficult with something which demands more accuracy. Measuring dosage is much easier using the dial on the Wegovy pen.

And what if you accidentally double-dose on the Wegovy tablet one morning by mistake? I’m always forgetting to take my low-dose thyroid medication, which ultimately doesn’t make or break my situation – but missing the Wegovy pill? What then? If you’re anything like me, hectically trying to make packed lunches, feed the kids and get them out of the door to school each morning, it wouldn’t be that hard to do. The result could be double dosing, maybe making existing side effects – feeling nauseous, being sick, diarrhoea, headaches, dehydration – even worse.

I’ve always stuck to low doses of Wegovy so as not to get side effects. Another huge concern is that the pills are reportedly easier to counterfeit than the injections on the black market. A survey of 310 pharmacies by the NPA found 97 per cent were concerned the change could lead to an increase in fake pills being sold by unregulated suppliers.

As pharmacies across the UK are preparing for an overwhelming demand for the new Wegovy pill, I won’t be one of those in the queue. The NHS rollout could take years – according to reports – but I don’t think people realise there are downsides.

Yes, it’s true that it makes going on holiday with your weight-loss drugs easier as the injection pens need to be refrigerated, but setting reminders and the strict rules it requires to take a Wegovy pill daily aren’t for me. It all sounds like hard work. Although the other alternative of following a calorie-controlled diet and gym regimen would obviously be so much harder.