Before we try to evaluate the claims made by various weight-loss products, we need to first get clearly in mind the major factors that determine weight. Weight management for those who are overweight usually requires three components: diet, exercise, and supplements. Of these, the normal diet is undoubtedly the most important. As we found in Chapter 2, the current epidemic of excessive weight gain, above all else, is the outcome of changes over the last forty or fifty years in the quantity, the quality, and the types of food eaten in this country.

At best, only 20 percent of Americans consume the “five a day” fruits and vegetables recommended by virtually all medical authorities as the minimum required for maintaining good health. This means that 80 percent of Americans consume too little vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Of course, 60 percent of us are already overweight and another 20 percent appear to be playing catch-up. Many experts conclude that correcting the diet and dietary habits, such as eating breakfast and not eating late in the day, accounts for two thirds to three quarters of success in taking off and keeping off excess weight.

As with an adequate diet, very few of us get regular exercise. Those who are charged with guessing about such things estimate that only 22 percent of Americans exercise regularly. This means that only one in five Americans gets the equivalent of thirty minutes of exercise per day. If diet accounts for, say, 60 to 70 percent of weight loss success, then exercise may account for another 10 to 15 percent.

This means that supplements likely also account for 10 to 15 percent of long-term dieting success. Too often, we expect supplements to do all the work. This approach never succeeds over the long term. It does not work with prescription diet aids, it’s does not work with ephedrine and caffeine, and it does not work in the case of any other diet supplement.

Marketing machines, of course, always suggest otherwise. And it is certainly true that many individuals can lose ten pounds in ten days through a variety of means. Juice fasts, for instance, will cause almost anyone to lose massive amounts of water weight quickly along with lean tissue, but not much fat. This lost weight, however, will not stay off. Moreover, each time such a diet is followed, the weight will come off more slowly and it will be replaced more quickly and then some.

How about those ads that show a bodybuilder who lost twenty pounds of fat in only fourteen days? Can this be real? In a word, “no.” There is almost always a trick that is used to achieve such results. You take a person who is young, naturally very lean, and who works out regularly and place this individual in a situation in which he or she does not work out and massively overeats for four to six months. He puts on weight. At the end of this time, he goes back to his normal habits while he just happens to also use diet supplement X. Studies going back more than a century have routinely shown that individuals such as this, as soon as they stop the overeating and the enforced lack of activity, will see the weight melt away almost magically. Any product or even no product at all will work just about as well in these individuals.

The 60 percent of adult Americans who truly are overweight or obese cannot expect such results. In normal weight gain, each pound of fat equals about 3,500 calories. What does this indicate? It indicates that even if one could somehow target only fat loss no water or lean tissue losing a pound of fat is equivalent to losing the energy of not eating for about two days. In other words, losing even one-half pound of actual fat per week constitutes an achievement. Keeping it off for five years represents a marvelous success story.

Here comes the old adage: If it sounds too good to be true, it is. Sustainable weight loss— weight loss that stays lost usually ranges from roughly one-half to one pound per week until a person has lost as much as 10 percent of his or her initial starting weight. Even the most powerful products employed without a reduced-calorie diet, when tested clinically by disinterested parties, usually produce an average loss of about five to six pounds in eight weeks.

When you evaluate a product and its claims, always ask the following:

• Are ingredients and amounts clearly indicated?

• Is the amount of each active ingredient the amount shown to be effective in clinical studies?

• Are there any clinical studies using the product?

• Does literature about the product address a “condition,” such as belly fat, without ever addressing the issue of whether the product itself has been shown to be effective for weight loss?

• Are there warnings and cautions that apply to you?

• Are the claims for weight loss too good to be true?

About the author of this article:

Georgiy Kharchenko, selling: Fastin, ECA STACK, Phentramin D, lipodrene with ephedra