How to get a private prescription for a weight loss injection in the UK

The biggest myth: you can get these injections without going through a prescriber

A question our prescribers hear most weeks is some version of this: "Do I actually need a prescription, or can I just order online?" The honest answer is the same every time. Mounjaro and Wegovy are Prescription-Only Medicines under the Human Medicines Regulations 2012. That's not a formality, it's a legal requirement. Any seller offering them without a clinical assessment is operating outside the law, and the product itself is almost certainly not what the label claims.

The MHRA has been blunt about this. In 2025 alone, around 20 million doses of illegally traded weight loss medicines (roughly £45m street value) were seized, and enforcement officers uncovered the first UK site manufacturing counterfeit tirzepatide pens in Northampton. Some fake pens have contained insulin rather than the medicine shown on the label, with predictable consequences for unsuspecting buyers. You can report suspect sellers and suspected adverse reactions through the MHRA's Yellow Card scheme.

The red flags are consistent: sellers who advertise these medicines without asking for a consultation, social-media accounts promoting them alongside discount codes, and prices dramatically below the private market rate. If you're uncertain whether an online pharmacy is legitimate, the answer takes about thirty seconds to find, check the GPhC pharmacy register and look for their premises registration number. Ours is 9012878, verifiable directly on that register.

What a legitimate private prescription actually involves

Getting a private prescription for a weight loss injection through a regulated UK service is straightforward, but it does require a real clinical assessment. At nume, the process runs like this: you complete a detailed health questionnaire online, which covers your medical history, current medicines, weight and relevant conditions. A GPhC-registered Independent Prescriber (a named clinician, not software) reads your answers and makes a prescribing decision the same day.

Before a prescription is issued, your identity is verified by photo ID and your weight is confirmed on a live video call. That's not bureaucracy for its own sake. It's how a prescriber confirms the information they're basing a clinical decision on. For transfer patients joining from another service, or for patients requesting a dose increase, evidence of current treatment is also required. If you want to understand more about how the prescription process works in practice, that page goes into further detail.

Once a prescription is approved and issued by our pharmacy, treatment is dispatched the same working day for orders placed before 12pm, arriving free the next working day via tracked DPD. Every repeat order goes through the same clinical review, there's no auto-renewal, and no prescription is issued on the strength of a previous one alone. That's how it should work. The full picture of who we are and how the service is run is on our about page if you'd like to read it before starting.

Who is eligible for a private weight loss injection prescription?

The licensed eligibility criteria for Mounjaro and Wegovy are set by their respective product licences, not by individual pharmacies. In broad terms: adults with a BMI of 30 or above, or adults with a BMI of 27 or above who have at least one weight-related health condition, such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol or obstructive sleep apnoea. Lower BMI thresholds apply for some ethnic backgrounds under UK clinical guidance. None of those figures guarantee a prescription. The prescriber assesses the whole picture, including your current medicines, health history and whether treatment is appropriate for you specifically.

Some conditions mean these medicines aren't suitable, and the prescriber will tell you clearly if that's the case. Pregnancy, breastfeeding, and trying to conceive all fall into the not-recommended category. Treatment isn't licensed for under-18s. If you want to read about the NHS criteria and waiting-list situation before deciding whether private treatment is right for you, that page covers it honestly.

The private route through a regulated pharmacy like nume means no GP referral, no waiting list, and (once approved) same-day dispatch. But it still requires a real clinical assessment. That's the point. You can read more about what private weight loss injections involve if you're weighing up your options. For a broader look at which treatments are available, our weight loss overview is a useful starting point.

What "one transparent price" actually means at nume

When you see a headline price from any provider, it's worth asking what's included. Some figures cover the medicine only, with consultation fees, prescription charges and delivery added at checkout. At nume, one price covers the free consultation, the clinical review, the prescription, the treatment and free next-working-day delivery. There are no add-ons, no subscription fees and no auto-renewals.

We're not the cheapest option on the market. That's a deliberate choice. For a prescription medicine, cost is the wrong question to optimise for, the right questions are whether the pharmacy is GPhC-registered, whether a real prescriber is making the clinical decision, and whether the supply chain is the licensed UK one. Our page on prescription weight loss injections explains how that process works and what clinical oversight is involved at each stage. If you're trying to find prescription weight loss injections near you, it's worth confirming that any local or online provider meets those same standards before committing. For those researching their options more broadly, our page on weight loss injections that don't require a prescription explains what's available outside the prescription route and where the boundaries lie. NHS guidance on weight management injections sets out what proper clinical oversight looks like, it's a useful reference point when comparing services. Our FAQs page covers common questions about the process if you'd like more detail before starting.