Are Weight Loss Drugs Actually Making Us Healthier?

by Patricia Green, published on 2/17/07 by MedsAbroad.com

Health Day News takes a look at a recent study in The Lancet which considers the question: Is weight loss through weight loss drugs really healthy? The answer seems to be that the jury is still out on the question.

Three weight loss drugs are currently available: Meridia™, Xenical™, and Acomplia™. All will afford patients with some weight loss. However, the weight comes back when the drug is discontinued. Long-term side effects are largely unknown as studies are sketchy and patients who participate often quit the study before it ends.

The three physicians queried in the article (Drs. Raj Padwal and Sumit Majumdar, U. of Alberta, and Dr. David L. Katz of Yale U. School of Medicine) don't seem to find weight loss drugs very promising. In fact, Padwal and Majumdar both suggest that it is possible that the weight loss accomplished with drugs may not have a real effect on other obesity-induced health factors (heart health and diabetes).

However, studies show that Americans are getting fatter and fatter. There must be a reason that is not simply gluttony, because even thin people generally eat as much as fat people (anecdotal observation). Find the reason and deal with that. If pharmaceuticals can, in the meantime, hold off the unhealthy side effects of our diet, so be it. And, let's be realistic, self-image ("I'm so fat!") is also a health issue. So, the drugs that are currently on the market - lame though they may be - need to serve the purpose of changing our self-image positively and for the long-term, and/or changing our health profile positively for the long-term. If the drugs do not do that, then they are no better - worse in fact - than placebos.

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