Apatrim

Has anyone seen something that seems to be an article in their newspaper called "Demand soars for 'fast acting' diet pill"? The article goes on to talk about this miracle drug, apatrim, that suppresses appetite and makes people lose weight. It's so popular, according to this article, the phone lines are jammed with callers and supplies are limited. Wow! A miracle drug, just what we've been waiting for!

What could be wrong with it, too? There was this research study that shows the drug works within minutes to suppress your appetite. Even better, dieters "don't have to starve or suffer through intense exercise and it's been clinically shown to get great results."

And also, "Apatrim contains an amazing compound that has a known ability to help control hunger pangs*. This allows people to eat the foods they want, they just eat less*."
Aha. We'll get to those stars in a minute.

How does it work? "The active ingredient in Apatrim comes from a plant that grows in India. This 'miracle' plant is Caralluma Fimbriata and it has been used by native tribes in India for centuries to reduce hunger and quench thirst during times of famine and drought."

TB and I saw this in our Burlington County Times and thought it sounded great but a little too good to be true. And was this a real news article or an advertisement? I decided to check it out online. Well, well. Here's what I found:

Diet Drug Report

Newspapers around the country are running full-page ads -- disguised to look like regular news pages -- filled with misleading claims for a new 'miracle' diet pill called Apatrim that allegedly enables dieters to lose weight without either cutting back on eating or increasing their exercise.

The pages contain a bylined story from the Universal Media Syndicate (intended, no doubt, to be confused with the Universal Press Syndicate, which carries columnists such as Dear Abby and William F. Buckley Jr.) urging overweight readers to phone a toll-free number to order "every dieter's dream." ...

What we can confirm is that Caralluma Fimbriata, like the South African "succulent" plant Hoodia Gordonii, has indeed been chewed for many years by Indian tribesmen during long hunts to suppress appetite and enhance endurance.

But from there, the breathless weight-loss claims for Apatrim not only become more suspect, but seem likely to ultimately involve its distributor, PatentHEALTH, LLC , with the judicial system. ...

The so-called clinical trial referenced in the ad, an anemic study that involved only 26 participants followed for four weeks (a serious Phase III clinical trial of a diet drug would involve thousands of participants tracked over at least a year), was sponsored by the developer of Slimaluma -- not Apatrim. ...

Slimaluma was the first to start marketing a weight loss pill using Caralluma Fimbriata. Gencor Pacific, which makes Slimaluma, has sued the company making Apatrim for

false advertising, false comparative advertising, and a variety of other charges stemming from their efforts to sell a a non-extract Caralluma fimbriata powder product.

And those stars? Well, at the end of the article, there was a * and it read: "These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration..." Why is this is such small print?

Another miracle drug bites the dust as far as I'm concerned!