Illegal imports of the weight-loss drugs Wegovy and Mounjaro, popular despite their high prices, have surged, according to customs data.
The Korea Customs Service said on the 24th that 4,155 cases of illegal weight-loss drug imports, including Wegovy and Mounjaro, were detected between January and June this year. In just six months, the figure climbed to 3.5 times the full-year total for 2024, which stood at 1,189 cases.
Shortly after Wegovy launched in South Korea, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety announced in October 2024 that it would block overseas direct purchases of GLP-1 (glucagon-like peptide-1) weight-loss drugs, citing concerns over misuse and safety, and has since tightened customs controls. Still, attempts to smuggle in the drugs from abroad, where prices are lower than in South Korea, have continued to rise. From 2024 through the first half of this year, the cumulative number of detected illegal imports totaled 5,348. Over the same period, only 596 cases were cleared through official customs channels via import companies.
Most illegal imports came through the mail. In the first half of this year, 3,489 cases were detected in postal shipments, accounting for 84.0% of the total. Officials interpret this as the result of a sharp rise in overseas direct-purchase attempts, in which buyers individually order weight-loss drugs from overseas sales websites and receive them by international mail. Imports through travelers' personal belongings also surged, rising from 1 case in 2024 to 134 in 2025 and 656 in the first half of this year.
The rise in import attempts despite the crackdown stems from the large gap between domestic and overseas prices. Mounjaro, the top-selling weight-loss drug in South Korea, is a non-reimbursed medicine, with a four-week supply priced in the range of 200,000 to 700,000 won ($145 to $505), depending on the dose. In Japan, by contrast, Mounjaro is included in the insurance drug-pricing system as a treatment for type 2 diabetes, so even non-reimbursed prescriptions for weight loss cost up to about four times less than in South Korea. Some in the industry expect that prices could fall as competition intensifies if Hanmi Pharmaceutical's GLP-1 weight-loss drug "Epe" launches within the year.
