FDA approves orlistat as OTC diet pill
I couldn’t have asked for a better script leading into today’s blog entry.
First, we discussed society’s growing dependency on pills.
Next, we identify the rise in childhood obesity, and how parents must become more responsible (and held responsible).
So, what does our wonderful Food and Drug Administration (please note the sarcasm) decide to do…
FDA approves orlistat as OTC diet pill
*****
Let’s not FIX the problem that caused obesity… let’s instead encourage even more pill popping to mask the REAL cause of the problem. Forget about going after the cause… that would actually require that people did something (sitting on your ass doesn’t count).
People are too busy to exercise. Too busy to take care of themselves. Too busy to eat healthy. Too busy to go grocery shopping…
Everyone is too busy for everything… aside from eating and pill popping. And to top it off, the FDA has even supported the pill popping frenzy.
And to those who label me a food Nazi… I’m actually the opposite. I love good food, but good food doesn’t need to be JUNK. I recently read a nice description regarding junk food.
As quoted within the link above:
There is no such thing as “junk food”; there is junk and there is food.
This simple line speaks volumes for the simplicity of healthy eating. If we all simply ate REAL food, there would be no such thing as a diet and no need for an overpriced nutritionist.
It really is THAT simple. I’ve worked with pro fighters and summed up their training camp diet in less than 30 seconds. My advice is always similar, something along the lines of eat real food, such as fruits, veggies, meat, fish, nuts, eggs, etc. If man made it, try not to eat it. Drink non-calorie drinks such as water and green tea.
That’s about it… and believe it or not but REAL food tastes great. I love food. There is nothing like sitting down to a nice dinner with family and friends.
When you eat crap, you can expect that it will taste like crap. If you eat real food, you’ll enjoy your food and you won’t feel like crap afterwards… and you won’t need any FDA approved drugs to go along with desert!
Ross
7 Comments so far
Leave a reply
I saw this on the news this morning and everyone commenting on this was saying things along the lines of how great this is, and how it will help people who are overweight. No one said anything about the reasons why people are overweight. No one suggested that before popping a magic pill, maybe they should be popping some discipline, willpower, and common sense.
One of the side effects are some type of gastric discharge, or something like that. Even so, it will be a huge seller and more and more people will “fake” their way to health, rather than doing it the real way.
Tsk tsk tsk.
FTA:
“OTC orlistat with 60 mg of active agent per capsule helps lose weight by blocking absorption of fat and is only for those having a body mass index (BMI) of 27 kg/m2 or more. It is recommended that people on the medication take a multivitamin supplement that contains vitamins D, E, K, and beta-carotene at bed time.”
So what will we see in the coming months/years?
1. people will take the pill, but not the vitamin;
2. their bodies, becoming malnourished, crave more food;
3. they eat more than they were before taking the pill;
4. reported efficacy drops–prescribed dosages (and/or self-administered dosages) increase;
5. malnourished, over-doping patients start having health complications that may have to do more with their lack of conditioning and malnourishment than the pill; but
6. some lawyer will get hold of this and claim that the pill is causing the health problems. Then, of course, class action product liability cases follow.
7. Meanwhile, the overweight patients come off the pill, do not change their (increased) eating habits, and the health care system lurches a big step closer to collapse.
Hm. I’m usually not this cynical until Friday. I must be hungry.
I think I’ll buy a little GSK stock now, then sell it in about 4 months before the lawsuits start. It’s going to sell BIG until then.
Ross,
I thought you might be interested in the attached article on Nutritionism. It’s a piece by Michael Pollan (the Knight professor of journalism at the University of California, Berkeley) in the NY times is worth a read http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/magazine/28nutritionism.t.html?ei=5070&en=c68ce221c481f56b&ex=1171083600&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1170931106-BHtqW94vxD4JdzI8N5ELJg
Keep up the good work
Rannoch
Thanks Rannoch. I actually mentioned that article last week:
http://rosstraining.com/blog/2007/01/30/unhappy-meals/
Thank you again for sharing,
Ross
In 1985 the eight worst American states reported obesity levels in 10-14% of their populations. Forward just fifteen years to 2000, and only one state could boast such a good statistic; alarmingly 23 states had obesity above the 20% level – the rest were racing to join them. Since then things have got worse.
Is such a rapid and wide spread rise in obesity explained by a sudden failure in personal responsibility? The growing multibillion dollar fitness and diet industries would suggest that most people, no matter how ineffectively, are trying to avoid the health, social, lifestyle and economic disadvantages of obesity.
Is the blame for the nation’s obesity epidemic due to our sedentary lifestyles? If so, why does Japan have obesity levels of only 2%? The Japanese live similar modern sedentary lifestyles; and only 3% of the Japanese report exercising twice a week or more, less than half the American figure.
The blame, I’ll poke, lies primarily in the unethical and under-regulated food industry, where cheap and addictive high-calorie commodities like sugar are used as bulking agents, where the nutritional value of foods have been dramatically reduced through factory farm and processing practices, and where aggressive marketing practices have been exploited to mislead people into making poor choices and encouraging them to over consume.
Let’s talk strategy. Personal responsibility is an important and empowering message, in fact the only option available in today’s status quo – but the rhetoric of personal responsibility is subverted by the food industry to divert attention away from themselves. Food manufactures and retailers love this argument. With a moderation message they use it to defend themselves against regulation and criticism. So here’s my suggestion: if you really want to tackle the obesity epidemic it’s not productive to beret the discipline failings of sugar junkies, instead aim your punches at the food corporations. Given the relationship of food to health, our communities have the right to demand that food manufacturers and retailers act in responsible ways in exchange for the right to trade and make profits. Without the hope of political leadership on this issue consumers have to take actions into their own hands and boycott irresponsible manufacturers and retailers. Our communities health is being sacrificed for the sake of corporate profits; only an attack on corporate profits can safeguard the health of our society. Demanding greater personal discipline, now matter how seemingly obvious, will never win the obesity war; that’s why the food industry embraces it. Focus your attack Ross, and aim your powerful punches at the right target. A consumer boycott is how to get a KO.
Sorry for the typo’s: beret = berate, communities = community’s and KO should be K.O.
Take care
Tony
In response to this comment:
“Demanding greater personal discipline, now matter how seemingly obvious, will never win the obesity war; that’s why the food industry embraces it.”
I agree that our “war” against obesity must address more than the individual, but at the same time, we should not give a free pass for ignorance.
At some point, the individual must take responsibility for his or her actions. That is not asking too much of an adult in our world today. No one forces anyone to eat anything. Some of us choose to educate ourselves, while others remain ignorant and unwilling to change their lifestyles. Should we just look the other way? Of course not! We need to target the “attack” in multiple directions (one of which IS towards the individual).
No one wants to place the blame in the mirror. It must be someone else’s fault.
This IS one of the problems in our world today (which goes far past the problem of obesity).
Ross