France’s medicine safety agency ANSM said on Monday it had imposed fines on pharmaceutical firms Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly over their advertising campaigns for Mounjaro and Wegovy anti-obesity drugs.
The agency fined on Novo Nordisk France €1.78 million – one million relating to adverts promoting its Saxenda drug and €783,838 regarding adverts for Wegovy weight management medication for treating obesity.
The ANSM also fined Lilly France €108,766 for a campaign promoting its anti-obesity drug Mounjaro, seeing the adverts as “likely to constitute indirect promotion of medicines subject to mandatory medical prescription.”
French laws prohibit any advertising to the general public of the treatments.
Vous avez vu passer ces affiches de com’ sur l’obésité ?* L’ANSM y voit “une promotion indirecte de médicaments soumis à prescription médicale obligatoire” (Ozempic, Wegovy, etc). Résultat : 2 millions d’euros d’amende pour Novo Nordik et Eli Lilly. (*crédit Mahmoud Zureik)
— Nicolas Berrod (@nicolasberrod.bsky.social) May 4, 2026 at 12:57 PM
The national medicines regulator said that the fines aimed to “prevent any communication likely to promote the use of drug treatment as the principal response to obesity, to encourage the public to request this treatment from a healthcare professional or seek to obtain it themselves.”
The ANSM said the advertising campaigns were “likely to mislead the public in a context marked by extensive media coverage” as well as what it termed growing inappropriate use of medications which activate certain hormones in order notably to reduce appetite, and aid weight loss.
In a statement to AFP, Novo Nordisk France said it “strongly contests” the ANSM’s finding, adding it is “exploring all possible appeal avenues against this decision”.
Lilly France said it noted ANSM’s decision, while stating it believes its awareness campaign entitled “Obesity is a sick person’s problem” from a year ago was “in line with the framework applicable to communications relating to human health”.
According to a French study published in 2024, around 18 percent of the French population – equivalent to some ten million people – are obese.
