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The Harm of Using Diet
Pills
Diet pills, which are also commonly called appetite suppressants, have been prescribed by doctors since the 1950s.
When they were first introduced to the public, the majority of diet pills contained amphetamine which is otherwise
known as speed. This drug is highly addictive and doctors quickly realized that appetite suppressants that
contained it would not prove to be the remarkable weight loss solution they were searching for.
As time went by, several other drugs such as fenfluramine and dexfenfluramine (which are more commonly known by
their respective trade names Pondimin and Redux) came onto the market. Soon afterwards, doctors started combining a
drug called phentermine with fenfluramine to form the now infamous fen-phen diet pill. Anyone who has paid
attention in the last two decades will remember how badly that turned out.
Like all other drugs, weight loss drugs must be approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) before doctors
can legally prescribe them to their patients. Not to mention that in addition to approving the drugs for human use,
the FDA is also responsible for constantly monitoring the effects that such medications have on the health of the
people who take them.
As a way to deal with the constant need for FDA approval and regulation, the active ingredient that is often used
in many diet pills is not a drug anymore.
Instead, these products typically consist of naturally occurring herbs and are sold without a prescription over the
counter. Perhaps the most popular herbal supplement used in diet pills is ephedra which is also found to cause
major health problems. Green Tea and caffeine are also an extremely popular additive to most diet pills today.
Hopefully we will learn that there is simply no safe diet pill on the market. We should all just stick to diet and
exercise if we want to maintain a good weight.
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