TrimSpa Is Giving Hoodia Gordonii A Bad Wrap

TheTimesFreePress.com reported on the $25 million settlement between the FTC and the makers of TrimSpa X32, Xenadrine EFX, CortiSlim, and One-A-Day WeightSmart. TrimSpa was specifically investigated over a handful of ads that ran two years ago. The investigation resulted in TrimSpa paying $1.5 million of the settlement without TrimSpa's admission of liability.

TrimSpa was put under the microscope after ads featuring Anna Nicole Smith’s 69 pound weight loss with TRIMSPA X32 were widely reported in the media. The FTC found that the ads didn’t explain that Anna Nicole was paid — and more importantly, her Trimspa claims were not backed up by any scientific research. Trimspa has now been banned from making any further claims about the "health benefits, performance, efficacy, safety or side effects" of Trimspa’s supposed miracle ingredient, hoodia gordonii, unless it comes up with some evidence.

This case and the subsequent outcome, is really giving hoodia gordonii a bad wrap. I don't know what claims TrimSpa was making about hoodia gordonii in their ads, but I have a pretty good idea. Even though hoodia is extremely popular, few people know very little about it. Marketers are taking advantage of this and are hyping hoodia gordonii to be some kind of miracle weight loss pill. All hoodia gordonii does is suppress appetite. It does not burn fat or magically melt the weight away! Only authentic hoodia gordonii has the potential to suppress appetite - and it can take as much as 3,000mg per day for it to work.

From what I can tell by looking at the TrimSpa X32 product label, I question whether it contains authentic hoodia gordonii to begin with. And even if it does, it has very little of it, certainly not anywhere near 3,000mg! According to the product label, hoodia gordonii is one of many ingredients of their proprietary blend. The blend itself only has 668mg. Hoodia gordonii is listed towards the end of the list of ingredients, meaning there isn't much of it in the blend itself. So of the 668mg, how much is hoodia gordonii? You be the judge, but it can't be more than a few hundred milligrams and that's probably being generous.

My gut tells me that TrimSpa thought they'd capitalize on hoodia's popularity and market their product as a "miraculous" weight loss product because it contains hoodia. I don't know the details of the case, but I suspect that's what went down - and why the FTC nailed them on it.

I'm glad the FTC is cracking down on these companies who are exaggerating what hoodia does, but I hope it doesn't taint the positives of what hoodia can do. If adequate amounts of authentic hoodia gordonii are taken in conjunction with diet and exercise, it can be an effective weight loss aid.

Get the truth about hoodia and weight loss.