A South African consumers' guide to scams, pseudoscience and voodoo science, OR, a critical thinker's guide to the ins and outs of Complementary and Alternative Medicine
Researchers analyzed 57 dietary supplements sold online and labeled as containing: R vomitoria, methylliberine, turkesterone, halostachine, or octopamine.
The researchers found:
no detectable amount of the labeled ingredient in 23 of the products
the actual quantity of the labeled ingredient ranged from 0.02% to 334% of the labeled quantity in 34 of the products
only six accurately labeled products that contained a quantity of the ingredient within 10% of the labeled quantity
seven products that contained at least one ingredient prohibited by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration
“You get what you pay for” isn’t an adage we can always rely upon. A US study has found more than one-third of a selection of sports supplements bought online don’t contain key ingredients the label says they should.
Pieter Cohen, a clinician-researcher at Cambridge Health Alliance and Harvard Medical School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and colleagues ordered 57 sports supplements to analyze their contents.
Each product’s label claimed the supplement contained one of five botanical compounds with purported performance-enhancing properties. The substances have been included in supplements since a stimulant called ephedra was banned in 2004.
“The FDA does not preapprove these ingredients, or any supplement ingredient, for either efficacy or safety before their introduction,” Cohen and colleagues write in their paper.
“But FDA inspections have found that supplement manufacturers often fail to comply with basic manufacturing standards, … Read the rest
Stuart Phillips, has spent two decades studying the impact of our diets on our muscles. Speaking on the BBC’s Food Programme last year, he summed it up like this: someone consuming extra protein and exercising two or three times a week will see a minimal benefit while those working out four or five times a week might see a small benefit.
We don’t know what the long-term impact might be of adding large quantities of protein powders to your diet on a daily basis
Exercise physiologist Nick Tiller, MRes, PhD, argues that pseudoscience is a systemic problem in sports. He offers examples of prominent athletes promoting pseudoscientific health and performance claims. [Tiller N. Is sport a breeding ground for pseudoscience? Skeptical Inquirer, Nov 10, 2022]
He concludes:
Pseudoscience preys on hopes and fears—two sides of the same coin—and it also feeds on desperation. Because of the “win at all costs” mentality nurtured in high-performance sports, athletes exhibit plenty of all three traits. And such characteristics likely become intensified closer to elite level. Even though many athletes prefer evidence-based approaches, it only takes a minority of individuals, especially those who are famous or revered, to allow for the spread of misinformation and erroneous advice. Moreover, there’s little doubt that the culture of high-performance sport may be allowing pseudoscience to breed unabated, generally unchallenged by athletes, coaches, and scientific support staff, all … Read the rest
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Tainted Supplements Database, created in 2007, lists products adulterated with active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). Between 2007 and 2021, 1,068 unique dietary-supplement products were added to the database. A recent study has found that the products likely to include APIs were for sexual enhancement and weight loss.
The author noted:
Since 2016, the percentage of products containing more than one API has increased.
Since 2016, the percentage of adulterated products for sexual enhancement was higher, the percentage of weight-loss products was lower, and no muscle-building products were reported.
Some products with APIs were removed from the market by the FDA because the risks were too great, some were never reviewed by the FDA, and some combined multiple APIs in ways that make it impossible to determine how benefits compare to harms.
Reference: Continued Risk of Dietary Supplements Adulterated With Approved and … Read the rest
Protein has achieved a venerated status in the dietary world for everything from building muscle to preventing weight gain. But can you get too much of a good thing?
Protein powders that come in chocolate, strawberry, and cookies and cream flavors are doled out by the scoopful and mixed into smoothies, making it possible to effortlessly consume protein in amounts that far exceed dietary recommendations. A canned protein drink can contain almost as much protein as an eight-ounce steak, and snack bars or a small bag of protein chips can pack more of the macronutrient than a three-egg omelet.
But while some nutritionists have encouraged the protein craze, a number of experts are urging caution. They point out that protein powders and supplements, which come from animal products like whey and casein (byproducts of cheese manufacturing)
Banned stimulants found in weight loss and sports supplements Deterenol is a pharmaceutical bronchodilator that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) never approved as a drug for humans. The FDA determined in 2004 that deterenol is not permitted as an ingredient in dietary supplements. Although since 2018, deterenol has been detected in several brands of dietary supplements sold in the U.S., the FDA has not advised manufacturers to remove it from products or warned consumers to avoid supplements labeled as containing the drug. In April 2018, researchers made online purchases of 35 samples of 17 brands of supplements labeled as containing deterenol (or a synonym) to determine the presence and quantity of active pharmaceutical stimulants that have not been approved by the FDA for oral use.
The researchers found:
Eight of the brands were marketed for weight loss, six as sports/energy supplements, and three with
Cape Town – Marketed as a miracle weight-loss supplement targeting the bodybuilding community, the illegal drug DNP (2,4-Dinitrophenol) is widely available on the black market and doctors are warning that users often pay for their rapid weight loss with their lives.
It’s illegal and potentially lethal, yet unscrupulous sellers are promoting it as a “miracle fat burner”. DNP is said to accelerate the basal metabolic rate, thereby raising the internal body temperature, which can lead to rapid weight loss.
DNP is an industrial chemical, first used during World War I by the French in explosives production. It’s been used as a pesticide, a wood preserver and even a dye.
In 1933, scientists from Stanford University discovered the compound had some fat-shredding properties. It was then marketed as a miracle over-the-counter weight loss drug until reports of adverse effects such
DNP (2,4-dinitrophenol) is an industrial chemical used in making explosives, but sold with the claim that it is an effective fat burning drug. In South Africa, dinitrophenol is listed in Schedule 4, so is a prescription-only substance. Is that sufficient to prevent unauthorised access, as described in this Guardian story. And why is https://www.anabolics-sa.co.za/product/dnp/ flagrantly selling this product, in spite of bizarrely warning: “beyond dangerous is almost an understatement.’
‘Knowing it could kill you isn’t a deterrent’: the deadly trade in diet pills
DNP is an industrial chemical used in making explosives. If swallowed, it can cause a horrible death – and yet it is still being aggressively marketed to vulnerable people online.
There is no physical reason for athletes to increase protein intake with supplements, says the German Nutrition Society (DGE), who recommend a balanced diet to achieve all protein requirements.
In the last of seven position papers by the society, the paper recommends that protein intake depending on training conditions and goals should be at approx. 1.2-2.0 grams per kilogram (g /kg) body weight.
Regarding supplementation. Dr Helmut Heseker, professor of nutritional science at the university of Paderborn states, “In the everyday nutritional routine of athletes there is no physiological reason to supplement protein intake with supplements and a balanced diet is usually superior to supplements.”