Do Natural Weight Loss Pills Work?

It's a nice idea. We would all like to be able to pop that super-duper, all powerful "magic" pill and miraculously drop multiple dress sizes and fifty pounds overnight, but is it really feasible? Do weight loss pills, which generate worldwide sales in the billions each year, actually do what they suggest on the shiny plastic label, or are desperate consumers being hoodwinked by wilfully duplicitous snake oil salesmen?

There are many, many weight loss supplements commercially available containing green tea, chitosan, hoodia gordonii and lemon juice, to cite but a smidgen, but the sad fact of the scientific matter is that there is no credible medical evidence to support their use.

If you are about to spend your hard earned cash at the bottom of a holistic supplement barrel, it would be wise to bear in mind that none of the unlicensed products sold as "weight loss supplements" have been clinically proven to work over and above calorie restriction and increased exercise to any meaningful degree; they are a waste of money, says Professor Nick Finer (2009), consultant endocrinologist at University College London.

The only medicines specifically licensed for the treatment of weight loss management are called orlistat and sibutramine.

Orlistat works by reducing the absorption of the fat you eat, while sibutramine increases the feeling of fullness associated with plentiful food consumption by boosting levels of the "happy hormone" serotonin, which is naturally produced in the body.

The licensed weight loss medications such as orlistat and sibutramine do work to a very modest degree and they have been clinically proven to enhance weight loss by 8%-10%, but medication does not work for everyone, says Dr Robert Kushner, professor of medicine at Northwest University.

Almost certainly, the real key to successful weight loss management is not ineffectual, unlicensed supplements but cognitive-behavioural change a.k.a. thought and action. If an individual, for example, ceases to think and behave like an over consumer of calories, they will cease to be an over consumer of calories and "hey-presto" they will lose weight. It is fundamentally this simple, folks.

In conclusion, "natural" supplements do not seem to work; licensed weight loss medicines do work to a limited extent for some individuals some of the time, albeit with side effects, while calorie control and regular exercise work for everyone, all of the time; the proverbial "secret" of easy weight loss is to stop doing what a fat person does and to start thinking and acting like a successful weight manager, and this is a lot easier than you might think.