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November 8, 2012

The Eagle-Tribune (Andover, Mass.) in miracle pills:

If those magic weight-loss pills and immune system boosters they’re hawking on late-night TV seem too good to be true, it’s because they often are. And a new government report goes one step further, calling many of the products “potentially dangerous.”

Investigators from the federal Department of Health and Human Services recently bought 127 different weight-loss and immune-boosting concoctions either online or in stores across the country and found the labels 20 percent of those products carried false claims, some — that the product could cure cancer or prevent diabetes — downright fantastical...

The issue would be funny if there weren’t a risk to the public.

One would think consumers would be appropriately skeptical without prompting from the government, but if that were the case, supplements wouldn’t be a $20 billion-a-year, spottily regulated industry.

Once again, the old rule rings true. Caveat emptor: Let the buyer beware.

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