Diet Pill History

by: Healthy Living Supplements LLC

The human body is extremely efficient.  It takes very little energy to keep it running smoothly.  This is why dieting has been an integral part of human existence since almost the beginning of time.  And as civilization has advanced in terms of food processing technology, flavor creativeness, communications, advertising effectiveness, and leisure time availability, the human race’s ability to effectively balance energy input through eating and energy expenditure through physical activities has decreased to the point where more than 65% of Americans are either overweigh or obese today.

Diet Pills To The Rescue

Over the years the need for a pill that would help humans maintain a healthy weight has steadily increased.  While some of the diet pills developed have resulted in weight loss, it is important to realize that there is no “miracle pill” that will necessarily result in permanent, dramatic weight loss.  For most people losing weight and keeping it off is hard work.

The most important problem with diet pills is that individuals frequently do not eat properly.  In these cases when someone stops taking a diet pill, they often resort to old unhealthy eating habits.  It is important to know how to get the most benefit from the use of a diet pill.  In that regard we have complied some helpful information in articles entitled Weight Loss Myths and Weight Loss Secrets.  In addition, as you begin your weight loss program you should learn to adopt a healthy diet that you enjoy and are comfortable with.  Once you stop taking diet pills you need to permanently adjust your eating habits or your weight loss program will probably be for naught.  To assist in doing that we have written another helpful article entitled What Is A Healthy Diet?

The Early Years

About 100,000 years ago the San tribes’ people of South Africa discovered the first diet “pill” in the form of the herb Hoodia Gordonii.  It was very effective in reducing hunger and increasing their energy while traveling across the Kalahari Desert.  About the same time in India local tribes people discovered an edible herb called Caralluma Fimbriata that they used as an appetite suppressant and famine food.  Both of these ingredients have been perfected by modern day researchers and are used in some of today’s most effective non-prescription diet pills.

Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, physicians and patients regulated their food intake carefully in order to prevent disease.  In the 19th century, as the scientific classification of foods took shape, doctors and scientists began experimenting with what they called targeted diets.  William Banting is one of the first people known to have successfully lost weight by developing a targeted diet in the mid 1860s by targeting carbohydrates.  The low carbohydrate diet today is frequently referred to the Atkins Diet.

The Modern Years

Lucky Strikes' slogan, "Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet," was the unforgettable tagline of its cigarette diet in the 1920s.

Drs. Maurice Tainter and Windsor Cutting, two young physicians from Stanford University, began reporting in the early 1930s on the industrial chemical dinitrophenol's (DNP) ability to boost metabolism.  The chemical DNP turned excess food energy into heat instead of fat.  By 1934 after some 100,000 people had taken DNP in the United States, these doctors began to worry that people were taking too much DNP.  Easily available weight loss medicines were being produced everywhere containing DNP.  Fatally high fevers were thought to have been brought on by overdoses of DNP.  A forerunner agency to today’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the U.S., The U.S. Office of Drug Control, investigated and found a link between the chemical DNP and blindness and other problems as well as deaths due to fevers.  In 1938 as soon as the Agency got the power to remove drugs from the marketplace , DNP was one of the first to go.

The 1940s and 1950s brought slimming soap and such horrors as the tapeworm diet.

In the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, diet pills were primarily amphetamine derivatives, otherwise known as "speed".  They were all the rage, but Doctors ultimately discovered that they weren't as fantastic as first thought.  Little if any weight was kept off while some of the people taking them became addicted.  In 1952, 3 billion 10-milligram Dexedrine tablets, basically speed, were produced as diet pills in the U.S. making their consumption very widespread.  Dexedrine and later an extended release capsule called the Spansule are amphetamine derivatives.  It was not until 1970, when the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act was passed by the United States Congress that these drugs began to be heavily controlled.  Today they are classified as Schedule II Central Nervous System stimulants and are considered potentially addictive with many negative side effects.

Because of their high risk, prescription diet pills are only recommended for people who have a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 30 or higher [see our Weight Loss Secrets article for an explanation of BMI and how to calculate it].

Fad diets featured in magazines change as frequently as their cover girls, and range from elixirs of chocolate to cabbage soup.

In the mid 1990’s in the U.S. millions of dieters were taking a prescription diet pill nicknamed fen-phen.  It contained the appetite suppressants fenfluramine (or dexfenfluramine) and phentermine.  Many people had great success in losing weight but suddenly many of these previously healthy people were developing fatal heart disease.  In 1997 the FDA removed all drugs containing the “fen” ingredients because of their association with heart disease.  Today, phentermine is still available on its own as a prescription drug.

In 1997 the FDA approved a drug called Sibutramine.  It is a neurotransmitter that assists in enhancing satiety.  It has a number of unwanted side effects, contraindications, and interactions with other drugs.  There have been petitions for its removal but the FDA has not yet acted on them.

In 1999 The FDA approved a drug called Orlistat.  It is designed to prevent the absorption of fat into the body.  It binds with fat, which is then excreted through bowel movements.  It has some unwanted side effects and requires vitamin supplementation while taking it.

With all of the health risks of prescription drugs, non-prescription diet pills, referred to as dietary supplements, have increased in popularly over recent years.  Many diet pills used to contain a Chinese herb called ma huang.  It contains Ephedra but in 2004 the FDA banned Ephedra because of associated heart attack and stroke side effects.  Recently however, after a number of court challenges, Ephedra is back on the market but only in doses much lower than previously allowed.

The newest prescription drug is called rimonabant, and is being marketed as Acomplia.  It has been available in the European Union since the middle of 2006 as an appetite suppressant.  It is anticipated to be available as a prescription drug in the U.S. late in 2007.

A new effective entry into the diet pill market is called The Ultimate Diet Formula ™ developed by Healthy Living Supplements LLC.  It is a non-prescription weight loss diet pill that is made from all natural clinically proven safe ingredients with no know undesirable side effects.

 

Read our next Healthy Living Article - - How Diet Pills Work.

About The Author:  Healthy Living Supplements LLC is a dietary supplement company committed to providing consumers with the most effective high quality scientifically advanced formulas available today.  Through their Ultimate Healthy Living newsletter and articles like this, their customers receive the most timely, accurate, and up-to-date information on healthy living and nutritional supplements.  They are dedicated to supporting healthy living with natural non-prescription products that promote the well-being, youthful appearance, and long life of their customers while helping them to look, feel and be their healthiest best.  Their website is located at Healthy Living Supplements™ | The Ultimate in Quality Dietary Supplements and their newest product can also be found at The Ultimate Diet Formula ™ Weight Loss Diet Pill.