Posts Tagged ‘ weight loss ’

LAS Lookout: Fastin Weight Loss Ad – Read the Small Print

January 5th, 2012. By AbiK

Note to self: when a one-page ad in a magazine has 12 daggers—those are those “†” symbols that lead you to some teeny-tiny footnote disclaimer—pause to ponder what the ad is really telling you.

It’s important as now that we’re in flu season, we’re seeing more and more homeopathic ‘remedy’ ads popping up with questionable claims and the telling footnote or two.

The 12-dagger ad above is actually a recent ad for Fastin, “the world’s most advanced weight loss aid ever developed!†” (there’s that dagger!). The ad appeared in Self magazine. And yes, it has 12—no joke, twelve—daggers in it, all leading to the footnote below. Don’t believe it? They’re all circled on the actual ad above.

Just about everything but where to buy Fastin has a dagger leading you to the disclaimer (the disclaimer is reprinted below.

In fact, even the doctor’s statement has the disclaimer. And there’s another tip-off to something potentially askew: try to locate some quick background info on Dr. Mark Wright. You can’t. Oh sure, he has his own website, but try to find him on doctor rating sites like RealSelf.com, Vitals.com, Avvo.com, or HealthGrades.com. He’s not there. He’s also not showing up as

Tags: Dr. Mark Wright, false advertising, Fastin, Homeopathic remedy, Homeopathy, homeopathy-remedy-fraud, weight loss
Posted in Consumer Fraud, Drugs/Medical | 1 Comment »

Hot Potato Diet Drug Alli Up for Grabs, but Who’s Buying?

April 29th, 2011. By AbiK

On the heels of consumer watchdog group, Public Citizen, calling for a ban of diet drug Alli, we see that GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)—makers of well-known type 2 and last-resort diabetes drug, Avandia—has chosen to offload the once golden weight loss wonder.

Alli Sales Drop

Apparently, Alli is not so golden anymore. GSK just reported on their first quarter earnings for 2011, and Alli sales were not exactly stellar. Case in point, Alli sales in Europe were down £14 million in first quarter 2011 vs prior year. And in the US? That’s a bit more ambiguous, though GSK does report “The USA grew 1% to £241 million, with strong performances from Sensodyne, Tums, Poligrip, Biotene, and Breathe offsetting lower sales of alli and Aquafresh.” Translation: Alli pooped in the US (no pun intended, see below).

Ok, financials are one thing—but there’s more to the Alli story than declining sales. And it begs the question, why would Sanofi-Aventis—if rumors are true—be considering buying Alli from GSK?

Alli Safety Record

Let’s recall that Alli was only approved for sale in 2007. That’s not all that long ago. Then by April, 2009 Alli was the subject of conversation with the CDER Drug Safety Oversight Board—over concerns of an Alli link to possible severe liver injury.

In August, 2009 the FDA sent out its Early Communication to alert consumers that Alli was indeed under review for severe liver injury risk.

By May, 2010 the FDA announced a revised label for Alli (and Xenical) that would include a warning about “rare reports of sever liver injury”.

Fast forward to Public Citizen’s call for a ban on Alli this month—which draws attention to some digging consumer watchdog group did over at the FDA’s AERS database that found Alli to “have been associated with 47 cases of acute pancreatitis and 73 cases of kidney stones”.

And Those Other Alli Side Effects…

In addition to being linked to serious liver injury, Alli is not exactly a dieter’s dream. We covered Alli’s rather gross side effects in an earlier story—and since then it’s not hard to find Alli users online who apparently have no shame in sharing stories of “oily orange stuff” dripping down their legs. GSK themselves recommended wearing dark clothes or carry additional clothes in case of an accident.

Seriously—possible Alli side effects reportedly include fatty or oily stools, oily spotting, intestinal gas with discharge, an increased number of bowel movements, or poor bowel control.

So given Alli’s recent sales decline, the potential for more serious adverse events to occur while taking Alli, the outcry for a ban on Alli—and the fact that it’s really not a pleasant way to lose weight—why would anyone want to buy the Alli brand?

Well, regardless of whether it’s Sanofi-Aventis or someone else, I hope their business plans include cross-promotion with Depends and Subtle Butt…

Tags: Alli, diet pills, Diet Plan, FDA, GlaxoSmithKline, GSK, orlistat-side-effects-orlistate-liver-damage-alli, Public Citizen, Sanofi Aventis, weight loss
Posted in Drugs/Medical, Emerging Issues | No Comments »

The 61.5 Fat-free Wheat Thins Diet (aka the HCG Diet)

April 22nd, 2011. By AbiK

That caught your eye, huh?

And it’s not all that far off, except it is carbs. Not far off, that is, from the much-in-the-media HCG diet. See, along with the so-called weight-loss miracle HCG injections comes a 500-calorie per day, uh, diet. To those of you who’ve picked up a pack of Suzy-Q’s lately (880 calories per pack) that 500 may seem a tad bit miniscule—though it is the equivalent of 61.5 fat-free Wheat Thins. Your average apple weighs in at about 72 calories.

You’re getting the picture—500 calories is paltry. I’m sure if I decided to only ingest 500 calories per day and not even exercise—hell, who’d have the strength?—I’d probably lose a few extra pounds. Enough to have “waif” attached to my name. To put this in further perspective, most references to the average daily caloric intake per capita in the Congo seem to hover in the 1,300 -1,400/day range. Now envision consuming about a third of that. You betcha you’d lose some serious weight—if you could hold yourself back from desperately grabbing the Doritos—or just some plain lettuce!— first.

So what’s the big deal with this HCG diet?

Most folks—paticularly women going through IVF—know HCG, or human chorionic gonadotropin, as the “trigger shot” administered just before retrieval to stimulate ovulation (aka, the “butt shot”). But HCG has become increasingly popular for weight loss—off label. How’s that happen? An article over at Discovery Health provides some background:

“It was during research in the 1950s when one doctor, A.T.W. Simeons, noticed that boys being treated with hCG for underdeveloped gonads were also able to lose excess weight by eating much less without any accompanying hunger pangs. His interest in hCG soon shifted to its potential as a diet aid, and he published a paper touting its effects, as well as developing a dietary regimen for use of the drug as a weight-loss tool.”

Weight loss? Without hunger pangs? Sounds like a Jenny Craig-Weight Watchers-Lean Cuisine-heading toward gastric bypass addict’s answered prayer, no? And for some, it apparently has been. For a commenter, Toni, at Discovery Health, the HCG diet resulted in this:

“I did the hcg diet with great results. I did it 3 times and I lost 80 lbs. My husband lost 120 Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: diet drugs, HCG, HCG Diet, weight loss
Posted in Drugs/Medical, Emerging Issues | 4 Comments »

Jillian Michaels: The Real Reveal

February 18th, 2010. By AbiK

[Remember this little tidbit as you read this: Jillian Michaels’ father was a personal injury lawyer. Got it?]

So I’m trolling the net for some background on personal trainer and weight-loss-guru-turned-PR-quandry, Jillian Michaels. Most of the buzz is about her diet pills and the—surprise!—contention that no, perhaps they really don’t work weight loss wonders and are now the focus of a lawsuit…or two…or three.

But I’m over the Maximum Strength Calorie Control diet pill thing. Deceptive advertising? Looking like it. Lack of integrity? Uh, yeah. Potentially putting greed ahead of realistically attainable results at the expense of the emotional and physical struggles of her weight-challenged following? Well, that’s for others—and Jillian—to figure out.

As with a number of marketing efforts that rely on celebrity or boastful claims, what’s out there in print may undoubtedly come back to haunt you. So let’s take a little gander and look at some recent quotes from Jillian—her recent Ladies’ Home Journal interview is a good place to start—and it’s only from last month. Are you still remembering what I asked you to remember at the beginning? Then these quotes really need no explanation. Read on:

Jillian Michaels LHJ quote #1:

“There was this time when my parents were going through some s— and I was sparring with my instructor, and he kept kicking me. I thought he’d stop if I cried, but the more I cried, the harder he kicked. And he was like, ‘I don’t give a f—, if you don’t fight your way out of this corner I will kill you.’ And so I fought my way out of the corner.”

And this, Michaels believes, is the approach that’s necessary for people who have been making excuses for Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: diet pills, Jillian Michaels, weight loss
Posted in Defective Products, Emerging Issues, lawsuits | 1 Comment »

Hey Jillian, if Diet Pills are all it Takes to Lose Weight…

February 15th, 2010. By LucyC

Yet another diet supplement lawsuit was filed last week—this time against Jillian Michaels, “America’s Toughest Trainer,” as the Jillianweightloss.com site proclaims. 

In fact, two nearly identical lawsuits have been filed by women who allege that Ms. Michaels is guilty of false advertising around her product, Jillian Michaels Maximum Strength Calorie Control^TM. According to the product advertising on the website—”its proprietary formula restricts your calorie intake automatically.” 

Jillian Michaels, FYI, is one of the trainers who appears on the hit reality TV program “The Biggest Loser.” The show takes clinically obese people and gets them back on the road to health and happiness through diet and exercise—the two most time-trusted ways to lose weight. And the two most painful. 

So, it looks like Ms. Michaels was tapped by ThinCare International LLC to endorse several diet products made and marketed by the Utah-based company. No surprise there, that’s just business as usual. 

According to the product website, you just take two pills “Two Capsules Before Main Meals And You Lose Weight…That’s It!” Really? So why don’t they use it on the Biggest Loser? It would certainly save a whole lot of pain and suffering, which is Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: Biggest Loser, diet pills, Jillian Michaels, weight loss
Posted in Drugs/Medical | 10 Comments »