The Dangers of Diet Pills

Not regulated by the FDA, cheap diet pills are a dangerous trend causing severe side effects including death. Is there a natural solution available?
The battle of the bulge – it is one fought by people across the globe. America has now become a predominantly overweight nation with eight out of every ten people over the age of twenty-five being overweight. If you turn on the TV, you are assaulted with commercial after commercial for cheap diet pills. In an era where thin is "in", it isn’t hard to understand why these companies sell their pills in local stores, via the internet, and through television campaigns.

Who is buying these cheap diet pills? The simple answer is just about everyone. People from all walks of life are pulling out their wallets to purchase cheap diet pills as a possible "quick fix" for long term weight loss. These companies make big promises. Whether they promise more energy, a boosted metabolism, or astonishingly quick weight loss, they all have big promises.

A consumer often purchases these cheap diet pills without doing any research. Often, losing weight the healthy way isn’t as important as losing weight. Few people stop to consider the risks of cheap diet pills.

These cheap diet pills are over the counter medications. Probably the most rapidly rising segment of the weight loss industry, these medications are often unregulated by the FDA. This sounds like a trivial fact, but it’s not. Cheap diet pills that are offered to a consumer without prescriptions have not been tested by the government, and they are not subjected to dosage and labeling requirements. Although the manufacturers of cheap diet pills claim that these are not drugs but rather food supplements, the bottom line is that these pills really are drugs.

Most of these cheap diet pills have powerful ingredients that are similar to amphetamines. The problem is that, although many deaths have been reported along with other side effects, the numbers are unclear because they are unregulated and unreported.

Some of the many side effects of cheap diet pills are a general feeling of anxiety or nervousness, heart problems, diarrhea, irregular heartbeat, high blood pressure, and even heart attacks.

As the years roll by, cheap diet pills become more and more powerful. Now, pills are being manufactured to work on the brain, reducing your appetite to aid in weight loss. The side effects of these pills are even more serious. Chest pain, fever, high blood hair loss, impotence, heart damage, depression, and anxiety are just some of the many reported risks associated with cheap diet pills.

So what is the solution? If you really want to lose weight, and you realize cheap diet pills aren’t the way to go, you may find yourself frustrated. Jumpstarting your weight loss is important to you, but you want to do it in a healthy, natural way.


QUESTION:

I have considered using diet pills to speed up my weight loss. What is your opinion on diet pills?

ANSWER:

Not good. Over-the-counter diet pills are a temporary fix, and a poor one at that. They do not address the core of the problem by re-training eating habits and guiding one to adopt a lifelong commitment to sustainable healthy eating and exercise.

In addition, diet pills can be extremely dangerous to your health. They commonly have stimulant ingredients such as caffeine and amphetamine-like substances that can cause increased restlessness, insomnia, anxiety, hypertension and even irregular heartbeats known as cardiac arrhythmias. The ingredient ephedrine, which was once a common ingredient in diet pills, has been linked with several deaths and was recently banned by the FDA. Years ago people thought that fen-phen was the miracle pill answer to weight loss - that is, until they discovered that it caused damage to the heart. Don't look for quick-fix answers in a pill. Be aware that even diet pills that are marketed as being herbal and all natural can still be dangerous.

For most people, the risks of utilizing diet pills outweigh the risks associated with being overweight. To experience optimal health and reap the full benefits of weight loss, ditch the diet pills and proceed with a sound program of good nutrition, intuitive eating and daily exercise.