Hims & Hers Super Bowl ad slammed for ‘misleading’ claims

A Super Bowl ad touting Hims & Hers Health Inc.’s copycat weight-loss drugs is getting pushback from the branded drugmakers’ lobbying group, which says it’s “misleading” and potentially violates marketing rules. 

The Hims ad — set to the tune of This is America by Childish Gambino — touts its “life-changing” and “doctor-trusted” weight-loss medications while railing against the pitfalls of the US healthcare system. The telehealth company sells cheaper versions of branded anti-obesity drugs like Novo Nordisk A/S’s Wegovy.  

Pharmaceutical companies are trying to fend off competition from makers of lower-priced versions of their weight-loss drugs, like those sold by Hims and other telehealth giants. 

Hims is “spending millions of dollars to run a misleading Super Bowl ad that misrepresents the safety and efficacy of their knockoff GLP-1 medicines,” the drug industry’s main lobbying group, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said Thursday in a statement. “What’s unclear is how regulators are allowing this.”

In a separate letter, the Partnership for Safe Medicines called the ad “dangerous” and urged US Food and Drug Administration officials to pull it before it’s seen by millions around the world during the National Football League championship game on Feb. 9. 

Hims didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. The shares fell 2.4% at 1:52 p.m. in New York, paring some earlier losses.

It’s the latest high-profile skirmish over compounded drugs, copies of brand-name medicines whose sales the Food and Drug Administration allows during shortages. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have turned to telehealth companies’ compounded products after struggling to access the brand-name drugs due to high prices and supply bottlenecks. 

Compounded drugs don’t undergo the same rigorous pre-approval testing that US regulators require for their branded counterparts. Novo and obesity rival Eli Lilly & Co. have been raising alarms for months about the dangers of such copycat drugs, alleging that they may contain bacteria or other impurities. Issues with compounded weight-loss drugs have been investigated by state boards of pharmacy across the country.

Compounding pharmacies, for their part, say they make high-quality drugs using ingredients from legitimate suppliers. They argue that they play an important role in making sure medicines are available during shortages of FDA-approved drugs. But trade associations have warned companies not to make claims about the safety and effectiveness of compounded drugs to mitigate legal risk. 

The Hims ad violates federal rules requiring “that advertising for prescription drugs – including compounded drugs – not be false or misleading,” PhRMA said. It omits the type of risk information that drug manufacturers are required to provide in direct-to-consumer ads and fails to clearly disclose that compounded drugs aren’t FDA-approved, the lobby group said.

The Hims advertisement does briefly display a message stating that compounded drugs are not FDA-approved.

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