Is it safe to take reta bought online for weight loss?

[Harriette678]

a friend of a friend has lost a lot weight, and found out she is taking Reta which she says isn’t approved yet but has got it via online.

she told us all during a catch up and seems to be going well for her, and she knows a lot of other people taking it.

I’m a bit worried for her, it’s only in clinical trials isn’t it? Does that mean it’s ok? Is this safe? I started looking at Reddit and there’s a community of thousands of people taking it.

really confused, I’ve got a few stone to lose and looking at glp
options. She’s paying 1/4 what Mounjaro would be.

looking for neutral views as I’m feeling a bit judgey. Is it as concerning taking this reta, where does it even come from as I assume not Eli lily?!

I know someone that took it - now has lots of health problems, under care of hospital consultants- they have actually reached out to the trial for help. Lots of her work colleagues were on this without issue. She is very ill, not able to eat, lost loads of weight and still losing even though she is not taking the drug, has developed quite bad hair loss - waiting for a dermatologist to confirm if alopecia, joint pain……. You get the picture. It’s definitely a gamble

But they aren't taking it. They are taking something similar which is black market fake stuff. What are people not getting about that? Would you take black market fake medication under any other circumstances??

Everyone who takes illegal drugs always says they’re fine until something bad happens then it’s a bit too bloody late for regrets. 😩

I wonder if they’d be as willing to play Russian roulette with a loaded gun?
No difference. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Maybe @whattodowhattodo1 should read this article about a ‘safe’ drug purchased on the internet.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gd82vvvdno

No way is it safe because as people are pointing out, you don’t know what the hell you are buying. TikTok is full of drug pushers trying to get others to sign up to this. I started a thread on here about Team RH promising cut price WLI to members and they also talk about “reta” in their videos as if it’s a totally normal thing that people should be taking and not a black market god knows what.

Anecdotally I’ve heard that not only does it shut off hunger, it also shuts off thirst, meaning there’s a significant risk of dehydration. It sounds really scary. I take a low dose of Mounjaro that doesn’t do much to suppress my appetite (but keeps my binge eating in check) but I wouldn’t touch retatrutide.

And fingers crossed they stay that way.

But with any unregulated substance bought online, there’s no way of knowing whether that will always be the case.

You’re relying on an unknown manufacturer to consistently use the correct ingredients, at the correct concentrations, and to follow appropriate manufacturing and storage processes. A change in a raw material supplier or formulation, contamination, poor storage, or simply a mistake during production could mean that what’s in the bottle isn’t actually what you think it is. And with an unregulated product, there’s often very little oversight or testing to pick that up.

And it’s not just about whether the peptide itself is the one labelled on the bottle. The purity of it, any contaminants, whether it has degraded or formed aggregates/combined molecules, whether the concentration is actually correct, and whether something about the way it has been produced could make it more likely to trigger an immune response all matter too.

That’s the bit that would make me uncomfortable, you’re essentially having to trust a full unknown supply chain - from raw materials, right through to it arriving on your doorstep - for something you are injecting into your body.

You can send samples to independent laboratories who can determine the compound.

I know several people on it, I think it’s more common than people think.

Someone I work with is on reta, she’s had fantastic results but I think she is insane. I am a very slow responder on Wegovy 7.2 and have lost 20kgs in the last 18months, she’s lost that since Christmas. However, I wouldn’t take it. She goes to someone who injects her weekly, the whole thing is dodgy.

My sister is a nurse and taking reta!! Trying to talk me into it “it’s so much cheaper and so much more effective than mounjaro” but I wouldn’t risk my health and leaving my kids motherless chasing fake drugs for weight loss.

Even if they could verify it's the same drug, it's still daft to take something before the trials are completed. They won't know if there are any contraindications. You only need to look at the Fen-Phen scandal to know that seeming to be fine isn't good enough. The women who experienced damage to their heart valves didn't have any symptoms, until they went into heart failure. Those drugs were FDA approved but no one had studied how they would react together or using them long term.

people do all sorts of daft things. How many people take recreational drugs? Humans will always do daft things.

I’d like to think our medical testing has improved tenfold since that scandal tbh. I’m sure we’ve come a long way with regards to safety testing of meds.

I know people will always do stupid things, just pointing out that the issue isn't 'just' that it could be something else they're injecting.