Slimming Pills

Every year there is a new pill or potion that claims to do it all for you – starch blockers, fat blockers, appetite suppressants, slimming pills. Avoid them at all costs. You can't cheat the body without paying a price.

Starch blockers inhibit the digestion of carbohydrate. The theory is that if you can't digest it you can't gain weight. But having a whole lot of undigested carbohydrate in the digestive tract is bad news. It feeds the wrong kind of bugs, causing bacterial and yeast infections as well as terrible gas.

Much touted as an answer to weight loss is a supplement called chitosan, sometimes called the fat attractor or fat magnet, which inhibits the digestion of fat. It apparently works because it has a positive charge and attracts fats, which have a negative charge. Once bound together with chitosan, the fat is less likely to be absorbed and passes through the body, so it is claimed, and cholesterol levels decrease.

However, three studies have found no significant differences in either weight or cholesterol levels between people taking chitosan and those taking a placebo. One study involved 30 overweight people who took chitosan or a placebo for 28 days while eating their normal diet. There was no difference in weight or cholesterol. The second study involving 51 obese women found that the chitosan group had slightly greater cholesterol reduction than the placebo group, but no difference in weight loss after eight weeks." Another study, with 68 obese men and women, found no improvement in weight or cholesterol.

Drug companies are also cashing in on the weight-loss market with drugs that stop you from digesting fat. An example is Xenical, the drug name for a chemical called orlistat. This drug does actually work, in the sense that it does reduce fat absorption. The immediate potential side effects are oily spotting, gas with discharge, oily or fatty stools, oily discharge and an inability to control bowel movements. If that doesn't put you off, more worrying are the effects on essential fats, so vital for heart, brain and skin. Since EFAs are probably the most commonly deficient nutrient in the West, the last thing you want is to swallow something that stops you from using the little there is in your diet. Also, it probably isn't a good idea to have undigested fat in your digestive tract.