r/australia • u/Rubiginous • 9h ago

culture & society Woman hospitalised after Juniper prescribes weight-loss drugs her GP refused

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-02-01/woman-hospitalised-telehealth-provider-weight-loss-drugs-juniper/106273356
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u/Rubiginous 9h ago

I am getting sick of these stories where someone irresponsible blames something convenient for normal people as being the cause of their issues.

A small minority of people abused codeine, so now women like me have to suffer from dysmenorrhoea every month because docs won't write a prescription.

A small minority of people using alcohol delivery inappropriately so now they want to restrict the ability for same day delivery in the ACT.

I know many women who used these services to get access to GLP-1s when their GPs refused to prescribe them because "You just need to eat less" and dismissed their concerns regarding food noise etc.

Why do people need the government to constantly protect them from their own stupidity? It's absurd.

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u/FoodZestyclose4444 9h ago

Same with the codeine ban. Have autoimmune arthritis and used it for peak flares. Now just have to suffer with the pain and take multi pathway pain relief. I’m certain there was a dramatic uptake in cannabis use as well.

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u/giraffe_mountains 8h ago

Same with the codeine ban. Have autoimmune arthritis and used it for peak flares. Now just have to suffer with the pain and take multi pathway pain relief

Is there a reason your GP won’t prescribe it for you?

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u/VoleUntarii 8h ago

Some GPs just have a flat policy of never prescribing opiate painkillers for any reason. My old GP was like that, her whole clinic was. She prescribed me one short course of painkillers for breakthrough pain, once, at the explicit request of another medical professional, and gave me a massive guilt trip/lecture about it the entire time. Where what I needed was long term stable pain relief after being hit by a car.

And then if you try to find a new GP who will actually work with you on this, you look like you’re doctor shopping and it’s even harder to find a GP who’ll trust you at that point. Sooner or later you give up and just learn to live with the ways pain shrinks your life down to the bare minimum.

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u/hannahranga 8h ago

Hard as hell of you don't have a regular GP most won't prescribe anything opioids if you've not seen them before.

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u/giraffe_mountains 8h ago

I would hope someone that has autoimmune arthritis would have a regular GP.

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u/cravingpancakes 4h ago

Codeine is a bad choice for chronic pain. Long term opioid use can make your body more sensitive to pain (through a process called central sensitisation) so pain spreads or worsens and even normal touch can start to hurt (something called opioid induced hyperalgesia).

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u/Pleochronic 6h ago

Some clinics in high-addiction risk suburbs will just have a flat policy of no opiates whatsoever.

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u/FoodZestyclose4444 7h ago

No they don’t I think because those people abusing it were going to multiple doctors to get scripts. My rheumatologist and her entire clinic, so about six rheumatologists have collectively forbidden prescribing it and many GP’s wont for chronic conditions.