Zicam, Hydroxycut, Ephedra: Separated at Birth, now need Babysitter

September 16th, 2009. By Kristine B

What do Zicam, Ephedra and Hydroxycut have in common?—and no, you can’t look at side-by-side pictures for this one. If you’ve been following the news, turns out they have a lot more in common than you’d think. All three…

• were marketed as “natural” products that people turned to in a time of need
• weren’t required to test their safety before being marketed
• caused nationwide recalls when reports of serious side effects started rolling in

and…

• were assumed to be safe because they were marketed as “natural”

And while each of these has been yanked from the market, those of their ilk that are still on the market now need some babysitting (i.e., tighter regulation and increased safety testing).

The bottom line is that people think “natural” equals “safe.” Unfortunately, that’s just not always true. Something can be natural and still harmful—Poison Ivy, anyone? And the food industry is renowned for giving new meaning to “natural”. Check out the Jelly Belly site and you’ll see the superfruit mix is: Naturally Sweetened, High in Antioxidant Vitamin C, Made with Real Fruit Juices and Purees, and have Colors from Natural Sources. Great—but I won’t be getting my USRDA of vitamin C from ’em.

Zicam was supposed to help with cold symptoms—and it seemed harmless: a little squirt or swab in the nose, no acetaminophen-laden pills to pop, and you got your relief. The problem is that some people noticed that once their cold was gone, so was their sense of smell, and that can be a pretty big deal.

See it’s not just about saying bye-bye to those warm & fuzzy Hallmark moments as you breathe in the wafting aroma of fresh-baked cookies. Loss of smell can be a serious safety issue. After all, your sense of smell can alert you to smoke before your smoke detector goes off. It can alert you to a gas leak when no other alarms are around. Your sense of smell is a vital alert system, so when you lose it, you run the risk of losing a lot. Thank you, “Natural”.

Hydroxycut was a natural supplement designed to help people lose weight. The problem was that in addition to weight loss, some people experienced serious liver injuries. And lots of people also thought that dietary supplements containing Ephedra were safe to use, until many of those supplements were found to have serious side effects. Again, thank you “Natural”.

Now, I’m a believer in non-traditional medicines. I fully expect that there are products out there not made by the big pharmaceutical companies that can help with medical problems. But I also believe that anything that can help a person can also cause harm and for that reason, anything that claims to have a benefit, even one as seemingly small as stopping the sniffles, should be proven to be safe before being marketed. 

I’m not saying that all these “natural” products should only be sold in pharmacies with a prescription from a doctor—far from it. But if a company makes a claim that a product can relieve health problems, I say, “Prove it.” And, at the same time, prove that it is actually safe. 

Or, at the very least, warn consumers about what they might be getting into, so they can decide if a risk, such as the loss of smell, is worth the benefit of say, relieving cold symptoms. Or if the risk of liver injury is worth the benefit of losing a few pounds.

But since self-monitoring doesn’t seem to have a great track record for companies that market supplements falling beneath the FDA’s radar, it’s really time now that the FDA start babysitting dietary supplements and “natural” health-helpers.

Tags: Ephedra, Hydroxycut, Zicam

This was posted on Wednesday, September 16th, 2009 at 11:03 am and is filed under Defective Products, Drugs/Medical . Feel free to respond, or trackback. Read our comments policy.