Stephen Fry criticises weight-loss drug Ozempic over severe side effects: ‘I was throwing up five times a day’

Stephen Fry is the latest celebrity to criticise weight-loss drug Ozempic, after the medication made him violently sick.

The Blackadder star was left vomiting up to five times a day after taking the medication in a last-ditch attempt to prevent weight gain.

As an “early adopter” of the diabetes drug, which has swept Hollywood and been promoted by the likes of Sharon Osbourne and Amy Schumer, the 66-year-old shared that at first he thought the results were “astonishing”.

“The first week or so, I was thinking, ‘This is astonishing. Not only do I not want to eat, I don’t want any alcohol of any kind. This is going to be brilliant,’” he said during a recent appearance on the River Café Table 4 podcast.

Fry, however, was forced to stop taking Ozempic after he began feeling “sicker and sicker”.

“I started feeling sick, and I started getting sicker and sicker and sicker,” he said. “I was literally throwing up four, five times a day and I thought, ‘I can’t do this.’ So that’s it.

“The new variant, Tirzepatide Mounjaro it’s called makes it even worse apparently.”

The comedian said he was in America at the time when he read about the medication, many years ago.

“I’m an early adopter of these things. I happened to be in America, and I’d read about it, and I asked my doctor in America, my physician as they like to call them, and he said, ‘I think I can get you some.’ He tried me on it,’” Fry said.

According to The Mirror, Fry weighed over 290 pounds in April 2019. By August that same year, he had lost five-and-a-half stone due to Ozempic.

Many celebrities have commented on the use of Ozempic, with Celebrity Big Brother star Sharon Osbourne, 71, reporting she had “no regrets” about taking the drug although she feels she is now “too gaunt” and cannot put weight. Her daughter, Kelly Osbourne, incited fury after she said any critics of the drug simply “couldn’t afford it”.

Oscar-winning actor Kate Winslet is one of several celebrities to speak out against Ozempic, condemning the weight-loss medication as “terrible”.

Oprah Winfrey recently made headlines after she spoke about her own recent weight-loss journey in which she used a drug that she stopped short of mentioning by name. The talk show host did admit to using similar medication to Ozempic including Mounjaro injections.