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The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has seized 12,000 doses of unlicensed weight loss medicines during a raid on a country estate in Northamptonshire to foil what it described as a “major illicit manufacturing and distribution operation”.

The operation, carried out last Thursday by officers from the MHRA’s criminal enforcement unit alongside Northamptonshire Police, dismantled a large-scale manufacturing, assembly and distribution facility which was producing unlicensed weight loss medicines including retatrutide and tirzepatide and peptide products. 

The MHRA said it was its largest ever seizure of unlicensed weight loss medicines. Two male suspects, both aged 29, were arrested on suspicion of offences under the Human Medicines Regulations 2012.

The MHRA, who said “enquiries are ongoing”, said it “seized substantial quantities of packaging materials and what are believed to be pharmaceutical substances used in the illicit manufacture of the products”.

The head of the MHRA’s criminal enforcement unit Andy Morling said: “(The) hugely successful operation demonstrates, once again, the MHRA’s unwavering commitment to ensuring there is no hiding place for those who cynically put the public’s health at risk for profit.

“Medicines regulation isn’t discretionary – it exists to protect people. That’s why we continue to target the traffickers who seek to bypass that protection, taking down the infrastructure that supports them and creating a hostile environment for their exploitative and harmful trade.

“In addition to disrupting an organised criminal group, I’m confident that dismantling this illicit production facility will have prevented significant public harm.”