Last Updated on Sunday, 19 July 2009 12:39
Diet Pills – Legal Ramifications
Several diet pills not only produce severe side effects but contain ingredients that are potentially life threatening. The US-FDA recently issued press releases on the ill effects of several ingredients found in many diet pills, namely bitter orange, found in TrimSpa and CortiSlim, the herb kava and usnic acid. Bitter orange, like the banned Ephedra, works by constricting blood vessels and increasing heart rate. And these effects are amplified when taken along with caffeine. Ignoring this, many diet supplements combine the two to enhance the stimulant effect. Usnic acid has been shown to cause acute liver toxicity and possibly death. Kava has also been linked to liver failure and one reported death in the U.S. Under heavy investigations in the US, kava has been banned in countries like Canada and Singapore.
The catch here is that most diet pills in the market are not required to get pre-approval from the FDA owing to the wording of the 1994 Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA). This act basically treats weight loss pills as food supplements, creating a major loophole in the law for pharmacological giants to feast on. Under DSHEA, the FDA has to work hard to prove that these diet pill supplements are dangerous, rather than the company bearing the burden of proof. The best example of this is Ephedra, which took the FDA eight years to ban from weight loss products in 2004.
Yet another example is the much famous diet pill hoodia gordonii. Surprisingly, it is backed by just one unpublished manufacturer-financed study that included only18 participants in Great Britain, and another study on rats. None of the pharmaceutical giants would dare put forward a prescription medicine with a poor trial backing like this, but because hoodia is a supplement, it's not subjected to the rigorous approval processes established by the FDA for prescription diet drugs.
You Have A Choice
Diet pills are a multi million dollar industry, with everyone trying to get a piece of it. There are a few drug options for treating obesity but sadly they are not well researched. Research analysts predict several decades before they can lay hands on something that is beneficial to weight loss and overall health.
The quick fix path is indeed enticing but what’s the point if you’re not going to live well enough (or long enough) to enjoy it! Instead of being guinea pigs in a scramble for the magic pill, we could all pay heed to what James Stein, a cardiologist with the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says:” I think we need to get back to what really works - exercise and diet.", Safe and efficient indeed! A low-calorie diet along with a good exercise regime is the only right way to help you shed that annoying weight. Although this may seem like a hard and long term approach to weight loss, it is after all not at the cost of your mental or cardiovascular health.
In fact that’s the question we all need to ask ourselves at the end of the day – What would you choose: your health or diet pills?
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