The Danger Of Weight Loss Drugs

Open any magazine or newspaper and you will typically find several articles relating to weight loss. You may also see new exercise techniques and low-fat and/or low-carb recipes. Interspersed among these articles will probably be several weight loss ads for the newest and/or most improved diet drug on the market. Everyone is searching for the quick-fix solution to his or her weight problem. Why bother watching what you eat or exercising if you can simply take a pill and watch those pounds fall off? Well, obviously, if there really was a magical drug that provided easy weight loss and was healthy to boot, everyone would be lining up to buy it. Unfortunately, weight loss drugs often only offer unrealistic results and short-term relief. More seriously, weight loss drugs may cause serious side effects that can be detrimental to your health. People are typically given insufficient and sometime erroneous information regarding the ingredients, benefits, and side effects of a weight loss drug. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has repeatedly approved various weight loss drugs only to pull them off of the market after serious side effects have occurred among certain users of the drug. Weight loss drugs are big business to the companies who manufacture them. In the past, there has been very little testing done on many of these drugs before they were made available to the public. Most of the time, there were not any statistics available for long-term studies because no such studies had been conducted. Not only can the drugs themselves be harmful, but misuse of these drugs can cause all types of serious side effects and even death. Dieters take the drugs and suggested dosages into their own hands by reasoning that exceeding the daily supplemental dosage will create faster and more extreme results. Unfortunately, by the time they realize their health is in danger, it is too late. Some dieters even panic at the thought of their so-called miracle drug being pulled off the market. Ephedra is a prime example of this type of mentality. Once the diet drug Ephedra, also known as Ma Huang, was determined dangerous and was to be immediately pulled off the market, panicked dieters immediately began stockpiling as much of the drug as possible. The fact that several people had died after ingesting this drug had little or no effect on their own need and desire to continue to use this drug as a weight loss aid. Despite this health scare, there are currently over fifty new diet drugs being developed and/or awaiting approval. Unfortunately, the FDA is still approving many drugs without the benefits of long-term studies on their dangers and side effects, and, as long as these drugs are being manufactured, desperate dieters will continue to buy them. The key to successful weight loss is not subject to a magical diet drug, however. As the public continues to be educated on the benefits of a healthy diet and regular exercise program, the popularity of weight loss drugs may eventually decline. Until then, these drugs will continue to offer a quick-fix to an ongoing problem, and they may also prove detrimental to many dieters' health.

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