A 2007 study conducted by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services estimated that one in seven Americans have tried over-the-counter diet pills to manage their weight. Luring consumers in with the promise of easy weight loss, diet pills make a lot of promises but often neglect to mention the cons associated with consuming them.
Ineffectiveness
Dr. Heidi Blanck of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says diet pills make a lot of false or misleading claims about their effectiveness, namely that you can shave a lot of pounds off your frame without exercising or eating a variety of healthy foods. For Blanck, statements like these are hogwash. She recommends ample exercise, avoiding sugary snacks and drinks, adding whole grains, fruit and leafy greens like spinach to your diet, and saving money by cutting out the diet pills.
There have also been documented cases of criminals selling counterfeit diet pills only to make a profit off of people desperate to lose weight. These fake pills won't help you lose weight, and they may contain harmful substances.
Unsafe
Diet pill manufacturers sometimes rely on words like "herbal" or "natural" to convince you that they are safe even when they are not. Diet pills illegally imported from some foreign countries can contain narcotics, antidepressants, drugs that should only be prescribed by a doctor and drugs that are not approved for use in the United States. Products that have been seized in the past include 2 Day Diet, 7 Day Herbal Diet; Fatloss Slimming, Perfect Slim, Powerful Slim, Super Fat Burner and Super Slimming. Shipments were scheduled to be delivered to beauty salons and health food stores--places you might trust to carry safe products.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration also warns that driving might be dangerous after taking some diet pills because they contain stimulants like caffeine, ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. Stimulants can cause excitability and drowsiness, which make it more difficult to focus on the road.
Addictive
When diet pills contain controlled substances, there is a high chance that you can become addicted to them. In a 2010 report, researchers noted that popular Brazilian diet pills marketed online as dietary supplements led to addiction in some users, causing them to lose money and damage relationships just to continue taking ever increasing quantities of the drugs. One case required psychiatric intervention to kick the addiction and the patient suffered withdrawal symptoms like headaches, tremors and anxiety.
If you have a history of eating disorders, you should also be particularly wary of diet pills because they can aggravate the condition and make you more susceptible to diet pill addiction.
References
- U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: The Skinny on Diet Pills
- National Institute of Health: Features Associated with Diet Pill Use in Individuals with Eating Disorders
- U.S. Attorney's Office District of Colorado: Two Arrested for Illegally Trafficking Counterfeit Weight Loss Medication
- U.S. Food and Drug Administration: Some Medications and Driving Don't Mix
- U.S. Department of Homeland Security: Super Fat Burner, Perfect Slim Among 3 Million Diet Pills Seized by Chicago CBP in International Mail
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