The Right Move…For The Wrong Reasons

Posted By elissa on Dec 7, 2011 | 1 comment

After signalling its intention to act, the FDA finally made it official: warning letters have been sent to several manufacturers of homeopathic HCG weight loss supps. In today’s announcement, the FDA described it as the “first step” towards getting them off the online and retail market.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) today issued seven Warning Letters to companies marketing over-the counter (OTC) HCG products that are labeled as “homeopathic” for weight loss.

Human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG) is a hormone produced by the human placenta and found in the urine of pregnant women. HCG is FDA-approved as an injectable prescription drug for the treatment of some cases of female infertility and other medical conditions.

The letters warn the companies that they are violating federal law by selling drugs that have not been approved, and by making unsupported claims for the substances. There are no FDA-approved HCG drug products for weight loss.

The joint action is the first step in keeping the unproven and potentially unsafe products from being marketed online and in retail outlets as oral drops, pellets, and sprays.

Personally, I think it’s long overdue: homeopathic anything is a total fraud, so even if HCG was scientifically proven to enhance fat loss (above and beyond what the usual, very-low-calorie diet accomplishes), these products would still be completely bogus.

But – sad to say – I have an issue with the way the FDA justified it. The agency described the products as “potentially unsafe” and “dangerous.” Suffice it to say, this is nonsense. Unless the FDA has evidence that they’re NOT homeopathic; or are contaminated in some way; then the products are utterly harmless. It’s implicit in the term “homeopathic.” As has been demonstrated ad nauseam, homeopathic supps contain no detectable active ingredients at all – they’re waaaay too dilute. They’re strictly placebos: water (in the case of liquids) or sugar pills.

Homeopathic HCG is definitely useless and the claims are so much hot air. The FDA is doing consumers a favor (whether some of them know it or not) by swinging the clown hammer. But there’s no need to go overboard on the indictment…”unproven” and “deceptive” are quite sufficient.