Two Weight-Loss Drugs Will Go on Sale Over-The-Counter in UK This Week

Weight-loss drugs are marketed on the basis of unproved assumptions. In the case of the first of these drugs, the assumption is that obesity is caused by eating too much fat. This has misled many overweight people over the years into adopting an unhealthy low-fat diet, often deficient in calcium because milk and dairy products tend to be avoided as high in saturated fat. In the case of the second drug, the unproved assumption is that 'overeating' is the cause of obesity and that eating fewer calories will reduce weight.

Both of these assumptions are incorrect. Obesity is caused by fluid retention in people who are sensitive to salt/sodium. Once they know the truth about what has caused their weight gain, it is easy for fat people to lose weight. They just need to cut down on salt and salty food. This results in the body excreting some of the fluid retention (actually salt and water) in the urine and so losing what is often referred to these days as 'water weight'. This fluid loss can be speeded up by eating plenty of fruit and unsalted vegetables, because these foods are rich in potassium, and potassium tends to displace sodium in the body.

The fluid loss or weight loss is not helped by eating less fat or by eating fewer calories, so these drugs cannot of themselves help overweight people to lose excess weight. On the contrary, both low-fat diets and eating insufficient calories can and do harm your health.

Fluid retention depletes the body of calcium and other essential nutrients, so leading to malnutrition. Commonly the calcium deficiency has two (at least) adverse consequences, namely fat retention and bone weakening. So if you are overweight, I suggest that as well as avoiding salt as strictly as you can manage, and eating plenty of fruit and vegetables, you also try to make sure you are getting plenty of calcium, and plenty of vitamin D, because vitamin D is needed to metabolise the calcium.

I hope you feel encouraged to abandon dieting and 'magic pills' in your aim of losing weight, and to lose weight the safe, sure way, by reducing your sodium intake and optimising your nutrition. This will also help to protect you from fractures in later life.

Margaret Wilde
www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk