The world of peptides: a guide for Jamaican physicians

Who this guide is for

This guide is for the Jamaican physician who wants the facts before forming an opinion. Peptides are not a passing fad: they are one of the most successful drug classes in modern medicine¹. In Jamaica, though, the conversation is arriving mainly through informal channels. The Chair of the Pharmacy Council of Jamaica has said that Ozempic is being advertised on Instagram and offered locally without approval¹¹, and the Minister of Health and Wellness has described a social media post offering the drug with the caption "DM to order"¹². Below we summarise what the evidence shows, what Jamaican law actually requires, and what recent cases tell us.

Peptides: an established drug class

Since insulin, more than 80 peptide drugs have reached the market worldwide, for diabetes, cancer, osteoporosis, multiple sclerosis, HIV and chronic pain¹. The obesity data are now strong. In STEP 1, 1,961 adults with overweight or obesity lost a mean 14.9 % of body weight with semaglutide versus 2.4 % with placebo over 68 weeks². In SURMOUNT-1, 2,539 adults lost 15.0 %, 19.5 % and 20.9 % with three doses of tirzepatide versus 3.1 % with placebo over 72 weeks³. And in SELECT, which enrolled 17,604 adults with established cardiovascular disease and overweight or obesity but no diabetes, semaglutide reduced the risk of cardiovascular death, non-fatal myocardial infarction or non-fatal stroke by 20 % (hazard ratio 0.80)⁴.

On 1 December 2025 the World Health Organization (WHO) issued its first global guideline on GLP-1 medicines for obesity, with two conditional recommendations, and projected that these therapies will reach fewer than 10 % of those who could benefit by 2030⁵.

What Jamaican law says about medicines

Three statutes do most of the work: the Food and Drugs Act (Law 46 of 1964, amended in 1974, 1996 and 2011), the Food and Drugs Regulations, 1975 made under section 21 of that Act, and the Pharmacy Act (Acts 5 of 1966 and 6 of 1996), which created the Pharmacy Council of Jamaica⁶⁷⁸.

• What counts as a drug. The Food and Drugs Act defines a drug as any substance or mixture "manufactured, sold or represented for use in" the diagnosis, treatment, mitigation or prevention of disease, or in "restoring, correcting or modifying organic functions in man or animal" (section 2). The definition turns on use and representation, not on the label a seller chooses⁶.
• Registration before sale. "A person shall not sell, manufacture, import or distribute a drug unless" it "has been registered with the Ministry of Health" (regulation 40(1)); the Minister may grant exemptions (regulation 40(2))⁷.
• Import permits. No one may import a drug without first obtaining permission from the Minister (regulation 43(1)), and the Act bars importing any drug unless it conforms to the law of the country where it was made and carries the prescribed certificate (section 4(1))⁶⁷.
• New drugs. A drug not imported in sufficient time and quantity before 4 August 1975 to establish its safety and efficacy is a "new drug" (regulation 64). It may not be imported, sold, advertised for sale or manufactured without a licence from the Minister, and the application must include a certificate that the product is approved in its country of manufacture or export (regulation 65)⁷.
• Investigational supply. A new drug may be imported for the use of investigators who hold the Minister's written authority, with the Minister told in advance of its identifying name and both labels carrying the investigational statement the regulation prescribes (regulation 71)⁷.
• Prescription-only drugs. Drugs in the Fourth Schedule (List 4) "are hereby prohibited from being retailed except on or in accordance with a prescription from a practitioner", and may not be advertised to the general public (regulation 50). Prescriptions must be kept for at least two years (regulation 51)⁷.
• Advertising. No one may advertise a drug without the Minister's prior written approval (regulation 4), and no drug may be advertised to the public for the treatment, prevention or cure of the diseases in the Act's First Schedule, which include diabetes, high blood pressure, heart diseases and cancers (section 3 and First Schedule)⁶⁷.
• Who dispenses. No one may compound, dispense, store for sale or retail any drug except on premises registered as a pharmacy and by a registered pharmacist, and List 4 drugs only on a prescription (Pharmacy Act, section 18). Section 19 exempts a drug supplied by a registered medical practitioner "for the purposes of medical treatment"⁸.
• Adverse reactions. Anyone who receives a report of an unexpected side effect, injury, toxicity or sensitivity reaction linked to a new drug must inform the Minister immediately (regulation 70)⁷.

Penalties

Contravening sections 3 to 16 of the Food and Drugs Act is an offence punishable on summary conviction by a fine of up to one million dollars or imprisonment of up to twelve months (section 25, as amended in 2011). When a company commits the offence, its chairman, president, officers and directors concerned in its management are guilty too unless they prove the act happened without their knowledge or that they exercised due diligence (section 26)⁶. Under the Pharmacy Act, dispensing or retailing drugs in breach of section 18 is an offence; the consolidated text we reviewed sets a fine of up to fifty thousand dollars or up to six months in prison (section 26)⁸.

Doping law reaches the clinic too

The Anti-Doping in Sport Act, 2014 (Act 22 of 2014, in force since 1 January 2015) established the Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission (JADCO) and defines "Athlete Support Personnel" to include medical and paramedical personnel working with or treating an athlete⁹. That matters for peptides: the 2026 World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Prohibited List bans BPC-157 at all times as a non-approved substance (S0) and names tesamorelin, CJC-1295, ipamorelin, the GH-releasing peptides and TB-500 among prohibited peptide hormones and growth factors (S2)¹⁰. Jamaica's athletes are tested under this regime: in 2026 long jumper Carey McLeod accepted a two-year ban for three whereabouts failures in twelve months¹⁴.

Recent cases and moves in Jamaica

• Ozempic on Instagram (April 2025). At the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce's Anti-Illicit Trade Forum, Pharmacy Council Chair Dr Ernestine Watson said: "You see on IG Ozempic being advertised, and as Chair of the Pharmacy Council, I get all of the links." She added that sellers' sites disappear "after the second call"¹¹.
• "DM to order" (January 2026). Health and Wellness Minister Dr Christopher Tufton wrote that GLP-1 drugs are prescription medicines: "These are not supplements." He described a post offering the drug with no prescription or medical oversight¹².
• Registered outlets only. The Pharmaceutical Society of Jamaica has reminded the public that every place selling prescription drugs must be registered with the Pharmacy Council of Jamaica, renewed every year, and staffed by a registered pharmacist¹⁸.
• Bills in the pipeline. The Government's 2025/2026 priority legislation programme lists a Food and Drugs (Amendment) Bill "to allow for the effective regulation of Natural Health Products, including nutraceuticals" and a Nurses and Midwives (Amendment) Bill to regulate advanced practice registered nurses, both being drafted¹⁶. In 2023 Cabinet approved drafting instructions to give some of those nurses limited prescriptive rights¹⁷.

The evidence map

Not everything sold as a "peptide" sits at the same level. GLP-1 receptor agonists have phase 3 trials with hard cardiovascular outcomes⁴. At the other end, a systematic review of BPC-157 found 36 studies, 35 of them preclinical and only one clinical, and no clinical safety data; its authors warned that adverse effects are possible because of unregulated manufacturing, contamination or unknown clinical safety¹⁵. Under Jamaican law, any such product sold or represented for a therapeutic use is a drug, and a drug not imported into Jamaica in sufficient time and quantity before 4 August 1975 to establish its safety and efficacy is a new drug that needs a ministerial licence⁶⁷.

How safe are they?

Approved peptides have well-characterised safety profiles. In SELECT, 16.6 % of patients on semaglutide and 8.2 % on placebo stopped treatment because of adverse events⁴; in SURMOUNT-1, 4.3 % to 7.1 % on tirzepatide and 2.6 % on placebo did so³. The larger risk in Jamaica is the supply chain. The WHO has reported falsified semaglutide in every region since 2022 and warned that fakes may lack the active ingredient or contain an undeclared one, such as insulin¹³. Dr Watson has described patients harmed by counterfeit medicines, including a kidney failure patient treated for six weeks with an anaemia drug that turned out to be fake¹¹.

What it means for practice

Patients will arrive with these questions, or with these products. The law gives physicians clear anchors: confirm that a product is registered with the Ministry of Health⁷, prescribe List 4 drugs on a proper prescription that the pharmacy must keep for two years⁷, and report unexpected reactions to new drugs to the Minister⁷. The exemption in section 19 of the Pharmacy Act covers a doctor who supplies a drug for medical treatment; it does not turn an unregistered product into a lawful one⁷⁸. For physicians who treat athletes, the anti-doping rules apply to the treating team as well as the athlete⁹¹⁰. The physician who knows the evidence and the law becomes the patient's reference point; if patients do not find it in the clinic, they will look for it on Instagram¹¹¹².