Women on Weight Loss Drugs Are Having ‘Ozempic Babies’

Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro, and all the other new GLP-1 weight loss drugs are able to miraculously shed pounds. But it seems like they may be canceling out the effects of birth control, too.

The UK’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, or MHRA, has just issued a warning to women using these medications. They’re letting them know that dozens of women got pregnant, often unintentionally, while using these drugs.

These drugs work by mimicking hormones like GLP-1 and GIP to curb your appetite, regulate blood sugar, and make your stomach think it’s full so you eat less without feeling like you’re starving all the time. It might also make you put on all that weight you lost in the form of a pregnancy that you perhaps did not want otherwise, you would not have been taking birth control pills to begin with.

Weight-Loss Drugs Like Ozempic Might Be Messing With Your Birth Control

Specifically, Mounjaro and others like semaglutide-based Ozempic and Wegovy might slow digestion so much that oral contraceptives aren’t properly absorbed. The MHRA has logged 40 pregnancy reports linked to these drugs, including 26 from Mounjaro alone.

To be clear, while there’s little data on the effects of GLP-1 medications during pregnancy, it’s generally considered unsafe to take drugs while pregnant. What we do know for sure is that rapid weight loss can increase miscarriage risk.

Doctors are stressing that these jabs aren’t cosmetic quick fixes; they’re medications meant for actual medical conditions. Using them to drop a few vanity pounds is risky. Using them and thinking your birth control will still work is, evidently, even riskier.

If you’re on a GLP-1 drug and not planning to have a kid anytime soon, double up on protection. These injections may help you lose pounds, but they might also unexpectedly deliver you a whole other human.