Hims Inc., rebranded as Hims & Hers Health, Inc. after they went public in 2020, began as a telehealth company for erectile dysfunction and hair loss products.No real issue there, the products are well-established and a phone call or website consultation is more convenient and far faster than visiting a doctor's office in the modern Obamacare milieu. It's entering the compounded glucagon-like peptide 1 agonists (GLP-1) injections market that got them new scrutiny.
There is nothing wrong with compound pharmacies, they are regulated by state and federal agencies and are basically what all pharmacies once were, with better manufacturing standards. It's an upcoming Super Bowl ad that has safe medicine groups sounding the alarm. The Partnership For Safe Medicines, for example, [stated in a press release](https://www.safemedicines.org/2025/02/partnership-for-safe-medicines-statement-on-weight-loss-drug-ad-blitz.html) they are "unregulated", which isn't true. Organic food, that is unregulated; the $35 billion supplement market, also unregulated. All compound pharmacies are licensed and regulated by state pharmacy boards and must use FDA-approved products. Is a public company executive risking going to jail importing powdered rhino horn, like progressives on the west coast did to treat their COVID-19? Of course not.
_Image: Hims & Hers_There have been smaller bad actors, like those compounders selling salt forms of semaglutide, such as semaglutide sodium and semaglutide acetate, which are not FDA-approved, and with 7,500 compound pharmacies nationwide some will always be sketchy, in the short term. When they are uncovered, FDA shuts them down. And the bad ones all eventually get uncovered.There is no evidence I could find that Hims has done anything wrong so I asked Shabbir Safdar, executive director of Partnership for Safe Medicines, why they were being targeted and received examples of small companies being sent letters by FDA but nothing related to Hims. I asked again why Hims was singled out and the reply was, "It's a non-compliant prescription drug ad being shown to tens, perhaps hundreds of millions of people. It's singled itself out."I couldn't find evidence of non-compliance. DEA would be kicking in their doors because they are a high-profile target. In environmentalism and lawyers lined up against science, like weedkiller and baby powder publicity campaigns, in most cases targeting a company is due to their success. Environmental groups often only want a 'donation to fund awareness campaigns', which in common parlance is a payoff. Obviously I am not suggesting any financial motivation here but stating the company does not make it sufficiently known that this is not Big Pharma when such fine print was a waiver given to alternatives to medicine companies, basically everything you buy in a GNC, in 1994, isn't really compelling 31 years later. FDA and FTC would have them in court already if their ads were non-compliant.It's not the fault of the company that they only need fine print to be able to sell legal products, it's the fault of the same political party that saddled us with bans on nuclear energy, unlimited student loans, organic food with a government seal, and took money from science to give it to the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.The company stands by the safety of its manufacturing process and claims it can sell Wegovy for up to 85% less, which is certainly good for a product that has recently been a crash diet plan for rich people, driving prices up for people who need it.
With up to 100,000,000 watching the Super Bowl, if they are not using proper quality assurance, federal marshalls will be at their door. There doesn't seem to be any reason for concern yet, though.