Weight loss pills are not working to reduce weight for obesity, and this is evident from that the Bayer AG and several smaller companies agreed to pay the U.S. government almost $26 million to settle allegations of false weight-loss advertising claims, according to the Federal Trade Commission.
The settlements involve Bayer’s One-A-Day WeightSmart multi-vitamin, as well as the diet pills CortiSlim, TrimSpa and Xenadrine EFX, which are made and sold by other companies.
“You’re not going to find weight loss in a bottle of pills,” FTC Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras told reporters. “These ads are encouraging consumers to postpone the tougher choices that have to be made when one wants to lose weight.”
In the case of Bayer, the company will pay a $3.2 million civil penalty to settle FTC allegations that ads for One-A-Day WeightSmart multivitamins violated an earlier agency order requiring all health claims for One-A-Day brand vitamins to be supported by scientific evidence. One-A-Day WeightSmart contains epigallocatechin gallate, a green tea extract, which Bayer ads claimed could help increase the body’s metabolism to control weight, the FTC said.
The FTC also said two marketers of diet pill Xenadrine EFX — RTC Research & Development and Robert Chinery Jr. — will pay up to $12.8 million to settle allegations that the product’s weight-loss claims were false and unsubstantiated. In another case, seven marketers of CortiSlim and CortiStress agreed to pay an $8.4 million settlement, the FTC said.
Marketers of another diet pill, TrimSpa, agreed to pay a $1.5 million settlement, the FTC said. The marketers involved in the TrimSpa settlement are Goen Technologies Corp., Nutramerica Corp., TrimSpa, Inc., and Alexander Szynalski.