Pregnancy and semaglutide — the active ingredient in GLP-1 drugs such as Ozempic for Type 2 diabetes and Wegovy for weight loss — don’t mix. But what about breastfeeding?
Women should stop taking Ozempic and Wegovy at least two months before they plan to get pregnant to clear the medication from their body, according to the prescribing information.
If a woman discovers she’s pregnant while taking Wegovy, she should stop taking the drug because it may cause fetal harm, the manufacturer notes. Ozempic should be used during pregnancy only if the potential benefit justifies the potential risk to the fetus, according to the manufacturer.
But when it comes to breastfeeding, the risk — if any — to a new mom or her baby while she’s taking one of the drugs is less known.
At the same time, there's “significant interest” in resuming or starting semaglutide among women who’ve just given birth, says Dr. Fatima Cody Stanford, an obesity medicine physician at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and an associate professor of medicine and pediatrics at Harvard Medical School.
“Many of these patients are on these medications prior to conception,” Stanford tells TODAY.com. She’s a paid consultant for Novo Nordisk, the pharmaceutical company that makes Ozempic and Wegovy.
“These mothers will often have some rapid weight gain during the pregnancy course. They have significant anxiety around the weight gain that they're experiencing.”
The Infant Risk Center at Texas Tech University, which provides guidance on medication safety while breastfeeding, also reports “overwhelming interest” from lactating women in taking semaglutide to control weight. Calls about the drug have increased more than 500% from 2021 to 2024, according to the center.
“We hear all the time from parents who want to have their pre-baby body back,” Kaytlin Krutsch, Ph.D., director of the Infant Risk Center and an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Texas Tech School of Medicine, tells TODAY.com.
GLP-1 drugs are being "increasingly used" among women who've just had a baby, a research letter published on Nov. 24 in JAMA confirmed.
The findings are based on data from Denmark, where researchers analyzed how many new moms filled a prescription for a GLP-1 drug within six months of giving birth. Use of the injections started increasing in 2022, followed by "a sharp increase" in 2024.
Most new moms in the study who used a GLP-1 drug — mostly semaglutide — were overweight before becoming pregnant and only 23% had diabetes, suggesting they primarily used the medication for weight loss, the authors wrote.
The researchers cautioned the "safety of semaglutide use is poorly documented" during the postpartum period, when women go through physiological and hormonal changes.
"Further, the potential short- and long-term risks to the breastfeeding infant have been insufficiently studied," the authors noted.
While breastfeeding can contribute to weight loss for some women, that's not the case for everyone. If you're interested in taking semaglutide while breastfeeding, here's what to know.
Is Semaglutide Safe While Breastfeeding?
Semaglutide is a prescription medication that mimics GLP-1, a hormone the body produces after eating, which helps control appetite and blood sugar.
Based on current research, it’s not yet clear if Wegovy or Ozempic passes into human breast milk, and there’s no data on the effects on the breastfed baby or the woman’s milk production, according to the prescribing information. (Krustch says she's hoping to conduct additional research into these topics.)
Before using Wegovy or Ozempic, tell your doctor if you are breastfeeding or plan to breastfeed, the prescribing information advises. “You should talk with your healthcare provider about the best way to feed your baby” while using Wegovy or Ozempic, it notes.
Wegovy and Ozempic are self-injected. Semaglutide in pill form, currently available as Rybelsus for Type 2 diabetes, is outright not recommended while breastfeeding, the prescribing information says.
To Stanford, the answer to whether it’s safe to breastfeed while taking semaglutide in any form, or any other GLP-1 drug, is “a definitive no.”
“Just don't do it,” Stanford says.
“We have no data on what that would do to a newborn infant if these (drugs) are transmitted through breast milk. … I don't see that as safe because these medications haven't been tested in a population that's that young.”
This applies to both breastfeeding and pumping breast milk that’s fed to a baby, she adds.
But other experts had different views.
For breastfeeding moms who worry that taking semaglutide might also cause appetite suppression and weight loss for the baby, Krutsch says her research shows the drug doesn't get into breast milk. It’s a large molecule so “getting semaglutide in your milk is like fitting an elephant through the kitchen window,” she explains.
Even if semaglutide did get into breast milk, it would be difficult for the baby's body to absorb it just by drinking it, she adds.
The American Academy of Pediatrics says it doesn’t have any official policy on breastfeeding while taking semaglutide.
The amount of semaglutide in breast milk is likely to be very low, and its poor absorption when taken orally means “it is unlikely to adversely affect the breastfed infant,” writes Dr. Maya Bunik, a Colorado pediatrician and chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics section on breastfeeding, in her book about the practice.
Does Semaglutide Go Into Breast Milk?
Krutsch is the coauthor of a 2024 study that analyzed the breast milk of eight women who were self-injecting semaglutide while breastfeeding. It used milk from a database of new moms in the U.S. and Canada.
Semaglutide was not detected in any of the breast milk samples. The findings suggest “infant risk due to semaglutide in milk is likely negligible,” and fears about a baby being exposed to semaglutide via breast milk “are likely overestimated,” the authors wrote.
“As far as the immediate question that the moms worry about — is the drug getting into my milk? I can pretty confidently say, no, it’s not,” Krutsch notes.
The results are cited in the Drugs and Lactation Database.
Dr. Jean Vel, a maternal fetal medicine physician at AdventHealth in Tampa, Florida, calls the findings reassuring and agrees the risk to the baby is likely small, though he says it’s early in the research.
But Stanford called the study “really tiny.”
“We have eight women. We have millions of people on these medications,” she says. “We don't have any really true randomized controlled trials.”
Does Semaglutide Affect Breast Milk Supply?
This is an unanswered question, Krutsch says.
If a breastfeeding woman has a lower appetite, is eating less and losing weight due to taking semaglutide, Krutsch wonders how that might affect how much milk the new mom’s body produces.
Vel also says that’s something to consider.
“In theory, that would be another area of concern because if we're having a decrease in caloric intake, it could lead to dehydration and it could theoretically impact milk production,” he notes.
Krutsch also wonders whether the milk could be missing some nutrients.
“Are you really getting all of the nutrients that you need if you're really reducing your calorie consumption?” Krutsch asks.
Fewer nutrients in breast milk could potentially hinder the baby’s development, her study notes.
Bottom Line
Women should talk with their doctor about the best way to feed their baby while taking Ozempic or Wegovy, the prescribing information advises.
Stanford says semaglutide should only be resumed after breastfeeding has completely stopped and a doctor has cleared the patient to take it.
Krutsch advises breastfeeding women to wait until the baby is at least 9 months old to start semaglutide. At that age, the infant’s diet will include foods other than breast milk so the baby can get nutrients from a variety of sources, she says. Krutsch also recommends breastfeeding women take a daily multi or postnatal vitamin.
Vel tells patients that in medicine, everything comes down to risk versus benefits. Given that many women have excessive weight gain during pregnancy and that obesity is associated with cardiovascular disease, and a higher risk of diabetes and cancer, “I think it would be reasonable for a patient to resume semaglutide while breastfeeding,” Vel says.
It should be shared decision making involving the doctor and patient, he adds.
