Last week I had the same conversation three times in my consulting room. Different patients, same question: "Julian, what do you think about peptides?" One of them was a well-known entertainer, a man who makes a living on stage and in front of a camera and who, quite reasonably, wants to recover faster and look his best for longer. He had been offered a stack of three peptides to speed up his healing. On paper they sounded wonderful. Better blood supply, faster recovery, sharper skin. He asked me a simple question: should he use them?

My answer was not the one he expected, and it is the reason I am writing this. I filmed a short video on it, which you can watch below.

Why everyone is suddenly talking about peptides

Peptides are having a moment. Walk through any gym, scroll through any wellness feed, and you will see them sold as the shortcut to faster recovery, better skin and slower ageing. Names like BPC-157, TB-500 and GHK-Cu are being passed around like vitamins.

The timing is not an accident. In 2026 the whole category sits in a regulatory grey zone that is being fought over in real time. In the United States the FDA's Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee is reviewing BPC-157 and TB-500 for pharmacy eligibility at its meeting this July, after both were removed from the approved compounding list on safety grounds. Here in the UK, none of these injectable peptides are licensed by the MHRA for aesthetic or wellness use. The National Pharmacy Association has publicly called for an urgent review of the "research use only" loophole that lets them be sold openly online.

Read that back. The people whose job it is to keep medicines safe have not approved these products. They are being sold anyway, usually labelled "for research use only" or "not for human consumption," and then injected into human beings.

That is the context I want my patients to understand before they roll up a sleeve.

The honest case for peptides

I want to be fair, because I am an optimist about medicine and I do not dismiss new science. Peptides are simply short chains of amino acids, the same building blocks your body already uses to signal, heal and repair. That is genuinely interesting biology. Some peptides, in laboratory and animal studies, appear to encourage new blood vessel growth, support tissue repair and calm inflammation. In a cosmetic context, certain peptides used topically in well-formulated skincare have a reasonable evidence base for supporting the skin barrier and collagen signalling.

So the idea is not nonsense. If you could safely tell the body to heal faster and age more slowly, of course you would want to. That is exactly why they are so seductive, and exactly why I want you to slow down.

The problem, part one: the risks

Here is what troubles me most. The injectable peptides being marketed for recovery and anti-ageing have, for the most part, been tested on certain animals but not put through rigorous human trials. They have not been through the regulatory process that exists, quite deliberately, to protect you.

That process is not red tape for its own sake. History is full of treatments that looked marvellous on the surface and caused real harm once the excitement wore off.

Coca-Cola was originally sold, in the 1880s, as a medicinal tonic. It genuinely contained cocaine, extracted from the coca leaf, and it was marketed as a health drink. It was also, unsurprisingly, highly addictive. The cocaine was removed in the early 1900s. Today's Coke of course contains nothing of the sort, but at the time it was sold to the public as good for you.

Thalidomide is the more sobering example. In the late 1950s it was prescribed to pregnant women for morning sickness. It was popular, it was trusted, and it was subsequently found to cause catastrophic birth defects in thousands of babies. The tragedy of thalidomide is precisely why modern drug regulation is as strict as it is.

Now apply that lens to peptides. Imagine using something today that, in one, two or five years, is found to trigger something serious, a cancer or a heart condition. Because these products largely reach patients through an unregulated grey market, there is often no guarantee of purity, no quality control and no certainty that what is in the vial matches what is on the label. Contamination and incorrect dosing are real risks with "research only" suppliers.

The uncomfortable truth is this: with these peptides, we do not yet know what the long-term downsides are. Not because there are none, but because the work to find out has not been done.

The problem, part two: unproven benefits

The second issue is quieter but just as important. Even setting safety aside, we do not have good evidence that many of these peptides actually work in humans for what they are being sold to do.

I have seen this film before. Anyone who has followed non-surgical treatments will recognise the pattern. A new treatment arrives with enormous marketing and enormous promise. Threads, Plexr, Ultherapy; each was heavily hyped in its moment. I am not saying nobody ever benefits. But the majority of patients who come to me having tried these have found very little lasting result, and over time the heavily marketed "miracle" quietly fades from view because the results were not there.

There is also the placebo effect to reckon with. Something can feel like it is making a difference on the surface. It is only through stringent, properly designed medical trials that we separate genuine effect from wishful thinking. Peptides have not cleared that bar yet.

What I told my patient, and what I am telling you

I did not tell him peptides are evil, or that the science will never mature. I told him to be careful with anything shiny.

When something new promises a quick fix, when someone is advocating passionately because they personally felt a benefit, that enthusiasm is not the same as proof. It does not mean there are no downsides. It usually means the downsides simply have not surfaced yet.

So my advice is the same advice I would give a member of my own family. Be safe. Follow proper medical advice. Only use treatments that have genuinely been shown to have positive effects, without hidden costs to your health. Let the regulators do their job. If, in a few years, these peptides pass proper human trials and earn a licence, I will be the first to welcome them. Until then, the regulation exists to protect you, and I would rather you keep your health than chase a shortcut.

The years I have spent in facial plastic surgery, and the work that has led to recognition in publications such as Tatler, have taught me one thing above all: the treatments that last are the ones built on evidence, not hype. Peptides may one day earn their place. They have not earned it yet.

If you are weighing up a treatment and want an honest, evidence-based opinion, I am always happy to talk it through in consultation. My priority is never the newest thing. It is the safest, most effective result for you.