She's not exaggerating. The country's first homegrown GLP-1 obesity drug has been available for two weeks, and Korean can now bring home prescribed foreign brands bought much more cheaply in neighboring countries such as Japan.
The liberalization comes even as U.S. regulators require warnings across the drug class about a rare eye condition that can cause permanent vision loss.
From Thursday, travelers may carry in prescribed obesity drugs such as Novo Nordisk's Wegovy and Eli Lilly's Mounjaro, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) said.
The medicines must be approved by the relevant country's regulator and legally prescribed and purchased. The general allowance is six containers, with larger quantities permitted within a three-month supply — equivalent to 12 or 13 single-dose weekly Mounjaro pens. Online direct purchases remain prohibited, while narcotics and psychotropic medicines are excluded from the relaxation.
"We will closely monitor changes after the measure takes effect, together with the customs authorities," the ministry said.
The same ministry had told customs in October 2024 to classify Wegovy, Mounjaro and Saxenda as harmful items, effectively blocking their entry through personal imports.
That did not stop people from trying. Customs intercepted illegally imported obesity drugs 5,030 times in the first eight months of this year, 4.2 times the total for 2025, according to the Korea Customs Service.
Park, who runs an online travel agency, said she regularly picked up the drugs during business and leisure trips to nearby Japanese cities.
The practice is familiar enough to have earned a nickname: "sushi-jaro," a blend of sushi and Mounjaro.
Japanese clinics moved quickly after the announcement. A cosmetic clinic in Fukuoka's Tenjin district posted a Korean-language guide offering Korean-speaking staff, online consultations and delivery to travelers' hotels.
The clinic advertises four weeks of starter-dose Mounjaro for 15,800 yen ($98.91). Korean clinics pay 278,066 won ($209.12) for the same supply before adding consultation and other charges. Korean-language advertisements from other Japanese clinics spread across social media the same day.
For Hanmi Pharmaceutical, the easier access adds competition just as its domestic alternative reaches patients.
Its Eppe, or efpeglenatide, began reaching clinics on Oct. 29 as Korea's first homegrown GLP-1 obesity drug. The first four weeks' supply costs clinics 129,800 won, less than half Mounjaro's introductory supply price. Patients' final bills depend on the medical institution's charges.
Eppe's price advantage narrows as doses rise. Its 10-milligram maintenance dose costs 299,200 won for four weeks, about 20 percent below Wegovy's highest dose.
The new domestic entrant is navigating a market in which policymakers are simultaneously widening access and considering tighter controls.
In June, the ministry proposed designating GLP-1 obesity drugs as medicines prone to misuse. Under customs rules, medicines on that list require a Korean doctor's prescription for clearance. The proposal has stalled at the presidential Regulatory Rationalization Committee, whose vice chairman has publicly questioned it.
Health Minister Jeong Eun-kyeong said on Oct. 27 that the government would review placing GLP-1 drugs under a "managed benefit" system that would bring their use under greater state oversight.
Wegovy and Mounjaro prescriptions reached 2.79 million from January through August, more than double the full-year total for 2025, according to Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service data.
In the drugs' countries of origin, safety warnings are expanding.
On Nov. 9, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) required makers of all GLP-1 receptor agonist medicines to add warnings about a potential increased risk of non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION). Sometimes called an "eye stroke," the rare condition can cause sudden, painless vision loss that may be permanent.
The FDA's analysis of 126 clinical trials found 6.4 cases per 100,000 person-years among GLP-1 users, compared with 3.8 among patients receiving a placebo or another type of glucose-lowering medicine. The agency described a potential increased risk; it has not established how the medicines might cause the condition.
"If NAION is suspected, promptly refer the patient to an ophthalmologist for evaluation," the agency said.
Both drugmakers questioned the implications. Novo Nordisk said the research does not establish that GLP-1 drugs cause the condition. Lilly said the FDA notice cites no findings specific to its medicines.
The ministry added NAION as a rare adverse reaction to semaglutide labels on Oct. 7, following the European Medicines Agency's recommendation in June 2025.
On Nov. 11, the ministry issued a broader GLP-1 safety letter advising medical professionals to stop treatment and arrange immediate evaluation when NAION is suspected. It also requested information from manufacturers to assess further changes to prescribing precautions. A suspected case of vision damage following GLP-1 treatment was reported in Korea in December 2024.
Beyond the emerging eye warning, the drugs raise questions about long-term treatment and follow-up.
In an extension of Wegovy's STEP 1 trial, participants regained about two-thirds of their previous weight loss within a year of stopping both semaglutide treatment and the study's lifestyle intervention. The findings underscore the challenge of maintaining weight loss after treatment ends.
For doctors, affordability and proper supervision need to advance together.
"These are really good drugs if properly prescribed, but too many people can't use them because they're so expensive," said Shim Kyung-won, a professor of family medicine at Ewha Womans University Mokdong Hospital.
"Prescriptions here (Korea) are often handed out without doctors even seeing patients, so a proper prescription from abroad, such as Japan, may actually be better."
For adult weight management, Wegovy and Mounjaro are indicated for patients with a body mass index of at least 30, or at least 27 with a weight-related illness.
Because the treatments are not covered by national health insurance, prescriptions do not undergo reimbursement reviews that could help enforce those thresholds. The national drug-safety screening system can issue warnings but does not itself prevent a prescription.
Bariatric surgery, by contrast, has been covered since 2019 for patients with a BMI of at least 35, or at least 30 with complications.
"When one doctor manages a patient, we can send someone who has been on it for over a year to an ophthalmologist or catch pancreatitis early," Shim said.
"The trials were done on obese patients, but here thin people take it, and some even end up in the emergency room."
AJP Takeaways
- South Korea’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety allowed travelers, from Nov. 12, 2026, to bring in up to three months’ supply of GLP-1 obesity drugs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro legally prescribed abroad.
- Hanmi Pharmaceutical’s Eppe, launched Oct. 29, 2026, starts at 129,800 won.
- The U.S. FDA required NAION warnings on all GLP-1 drugs on Nov. 9, 2026.
- GLP-1 obesity drugs are not covered by Korea’s national health insurance, and a proposal to designate them as medicines prone to misuse is still under government review.
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