 Many people make a new year's resolution to drop some pounds - and a new consumer reports survey says about a quarter of them will use weight-loss supplements. Trisha Calvo is with Consumer Reports. "On the bottle they make a lot of claims and I think that people want something that's going to make weight loss easier for them, but there's not really anything out there that does that."
Consumer Reports surveyed three thousand people and found just 9 percent of supplement users said they met their weight loss goals and kept the pounds off. But a lot more got some results they didn't want. "About half of the people in our survey who were taking weight loss supplements experienced some kind of side effect such as dry mouth or digestive issues, jitteriness, shaking."
The survey also found 20 percent of people think the food and drug administration guarantees the safety of weight loss supplements.
But the FDA regulates them much like foods, meaning they're considered safe unless they are shown *not*Â to be.
Doctor Louis Aronne says supplement companies need more facts to back their claims. "Someone's gotta do a study that shows that it works. Just saying that it works. Just advertising that it works. That's not enough."
He says those looking for a more "natural" way to shed the extra weight should reach for healthy food instead, and "supplement" that with some exercise.
