HCG Diet Dubbed Miracle; Some Docs Say it’s Dangerous

A diet that’s been around since the 1950’s is seeing a huge resurrance. But not everyone is on board with the drug HCG. In fact, some doctors are begging you not to jump on the HCG bandwagon.  Need help losing weight?  Pick your approach.

  There’s no shortage of diets, supplements, and appetite suppressants claiming to reduce your waistline.

  HCG isn’t the newest or most expensive, but it’s followers are calling it the most effective.

  “Last February I weighed 210 pounds and was wearing a size 18 to 20 clothes, and now I’m down to a six, kind of heading to a four.”

  Springfield acupuncturist Renea Barrett was losing the battle with obesity.

  “I pretty much gave up after awhile because nothing seemed to work.”

  She was also losing hope.

  “HCG is a pregnancy hormone excreted from the salts in a pregnant woman’s urine,” explains Barrett.

  She lost, a total of 60 pounds- enough weight to convince her to share her story.

  She opened her own clinic and sells HCG, in its liquid form and as an injection or nasal spray prescribed by a local doctor.

  “You do one squirt in each nostril once a day,” Barrett says, showing us the cannister that holds the hormone.

   You do that for 40 days, losing up to 40 pounds and then some if you take a break then repeat the program.
  “The HCG is emptying out 2,000 fat calories a day out of stored body fat. That’s circulating in your system and then you’re having a 500 calorie a day diet so you don’t feel hungry.”

  And there’s the rub; for 40 days HCG followers eat just one-fourth of the government’s recommended daily calorie count.

  “It’s a way to lose weight; you do dramatically reduce weight,” but Dr. James Bonucchi explains, not because of the hormone-because you’re starving yourself and paying the price for the rest of your life.

  “Problems with hair loss, some irreversible hair-loss.  I see in my clinic problems with thyroid function test being abnormal,” Bonucchi continues.

  Bonucchi says the hormone is not only ineffective- “HCG does not replace any nutrients in the body”- he also says it’s dangerous.

  “Outside of pregnancy it can alter thyroid function, it can alter a woman’s ovulatory cycle.  In a man it can alter testosterone production.”

  But that isn’t making HCG any less popular.

  It’s all over the internet and the Ozarks, with more health professionals selling the substance, whether they want to or not.

  “We had more and more people asking for it ,and we really didn’t want to carry it as a product.”

  Rebecca Still says demand eventually gave way to supply at her Bolivar business, though she doesn’t believe in the diet.

  “We had to tell them we don’t feel like it’s a safe way to go,” explains Still from inside her store.

  In order to prevent customers from going elsewhere Still now offers a diluted version of the hormone and a less drastic version of the meal plan.

  “We have 1,000 calories instead of the 500 calorie diet so we feel like it’s a little healthier,” says Still.

  Barrett agrees 500 calories is unreasonable- alone.

  “The diet by itself should not be done without the hormone, seriously. Because it’s barely above a protein deficiency level,” she says.

  When the HCG plan is followed to a  T, though, Barrett says it’s the only one that works.

  “On the first 40day cycle I lost 28-and-a-half pounds, and that never happened before with any other way of losing weight.

  Dr. Bonucchi tells us HCG is not an appetite suppressant.

  He says dieting shouldn’t make you drop more than a pound a week; cut 300 to 500 calories a day and you’ll accomplish that.

  The FDA has approved HCG for use, but not as a weight-loss drug.

  It’s been okayed for fertility treatments, but it is illegal for anyone to sell pure HCG without a prescription.

  And the FDA warns you should never order HCG over the internet.

  The NFL has banned the drug.

  Houston Texans linebacker Brian Cushing found that out the hard way two weeks ago when he tested positive for it.

  Cushing claims he isn’t taking HCG, but he’s been suspended for the first four games next season.

  To read more from sources who say HCG is a life-saver and not a health-risk, click here.

  To read more about the negative side effect opponents claim HCG will cause, click here.

Source:  May 25, 2010  http://www.kspr.com/news/local/94888604.html