CBS reports two deaths after use of products marketed as retatrutide

Documents submitted to the US regulator describe the cases, but causation has not been established and the accounts have not been independently verified.

CBS News said the documents described a 41-year-old woman's death in July and a 49-year-old patient's death reported in September. Both accounts mentioned products marketed as retatrutide and cardiac arrest. CBS obtained the records through an information request, with personal details redacted.

Retatrutide is an experimental Eli Lilly drug that the US Food and Drug Administration has not approved. The agency's published warning also says it cannot legally be used in drug compounding.

According to CBS, neither case was connected to a formal clinical trial. The FDA said it reviewed adverse event reports but did not say whether it had verified these deaths. A report in the system does not establish that a drug caused a death.

Eli Lilly said the cases involved black-market products and warned of incorrect ingredients and contaminants in suspect samples it had found. CBS also cited poison centre figures of 862 reported retatrutide exposures in the three months ending in September, compared with 460 in the preceding quarter and 249 at the start of 2026. Exposure reports are not counts of confirmed poisonings or deaths.