People will always look for a fast method to lose fat or simply want diet pills to help them reach their goal faster.

Besides some prescription drugs like phentermine and a few other prescription diet pills, the most popular diet product was ephedra. Apparently a large portion of the diet pill buying population still think ephedra is very effective due to the continued strong interest in ephedra.

People wouldn't have continued to search for ephedra in such large numbers every year during the time of the FDA ban on ephedra, if they didn't think it had helped them to lose weight. If ephedra products didn't work, they would not have been wildly popular for

many years.

A comparison really cannot be made between patented weight loss drugs manufactured by the

pharmaceutical industry and an all-natural herb that cost less than half the price of a

prescription. Plus the fact that in numerous, well qualified, scientific studies is was

proven that ephedra caused just as much weight loss, if not more, than prescription weight

loss pills.

A study published in the International Journal of Obesity and Related Metabolic Disorders

(18(2): 99-103,1994) showed the combination of ephedrine and caffeine to outperform

dexfenfluramine in the treatment of obesity.

Very curious is the fact that the active ingredient in ephedra that is responsible for the

weight loss is called ephedrine. But ephedrine can be found in many over-the-counter

medications. They are commonly used by millions of people to relieve allergy symptoms such

as asthma.

Ephedrine is readily available to anyone at his or her local grocery store or neighborhood

drug store.

Now, if the chemical ephedrine is considered so extremely dangerous while in the herbal form

contained in ephedra, then why is it allowed to be sold in the same concentrations in

medications? Why is it suddenly acceptable and less dangerous?

Somehow the fact that a very few deaths that were associated with ephedra over the period of

many years was blown greatly out of proportion. Millions of people used it on a regular

basis, lost a lot of weight and did not experience health issues.

The people that did not like how they felt when taking ephedra products simply stopped using

them. Problem solved.

Companies are being sued over ephedra, some have gone bankrupt and the FDA is close to

getting ephedra products banned a second time.

Yes, the debate still rages over ephedra products, their effectiveness and safety, but ask

the millions of people that could not lose weight until they started taking ephedra. Ask

them if they would rather be fat or take a controversial herb in which they personally

experienced no adverse reaction.