SV AND HCG DIET 7lbs lost in a week

1) You’re starving yourself. Your brain alone requires 600 calories per day to function optimally. By consuming only 500 calories per day, of course you’ll drop weight. But at what price? You’re cannibalizing your muscle mass, reducing your metabolism and consequently the effectiveness of your calorie burning. If I had you consume only 500 calories per day and then injected you with water, should I now call this the amazing water cure for weight loss? hCG has nothing to do with your weight loss. Starvation does.

2) It’s impossible to do. So you blame yourself (and not the author) when you cannot complete his plan. This is a core element of the scam. People who are overweight already feel guilty and are often filled with shame. After having laid down a lot of cash and not being able to successfully comply for a month or more, they figure “Oh well, just another diet I’ve failed at".

3) It is unsustainable. This regimen is almost impossible to adhere to for more than a very short period of time. There are no healthy eating or physical activity behaviors to learn. Eventually you would have to enter the real world. And then, what do you do?

4) It’s unsafe. You cannot meet your baseline survival nutritional requirements on a starvation plan. You can seriously alter your healthy intestinal bacterial flora with repeated “cleanses and detox" regimens. This can lead to altered bowel function and inability to appropriately absorb food nutrients, which can then impair immune function.

Further, many of you have a lot of weight to remove. You may also have associated medical problems, including high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol and high blood sugar levels. You could also be on medications to treat these as well as mental conditions like depression and anxiety. When people buy into a diet scam like hCG, they usually don’t tell their medical team. Rapid weight loss, radically altered food consumption, cleanses and detox regimens can seriously affect your underlying mental and physical conditions and alter the clearance and blood level of medications you’re taking.

Don’t turn yourself into a science fair project. Beware of these radical scam approaches as they can deleteriously affect your health and wellbeing. In the best of all worlds, you’re working with credible health professionals to remove your excess weight.

5) You’re not breaking food addictions. The promise is that you’ll no longer be addicted to food and any abnormal eating behaviors. Credible research has clearly shown that starvation and useless injections are not the solution to food addictions. Behavioral modification, healthy eating practices and regular physical activity have clearly been shown to control food addictions.

6) You’re broke. Take a moment and add up the total costs of the books and products required. That’s why I’ve renamed this “diet" the High CostGame scam.

Finally, there will always be an endless supply of frauds and scams created to prey on your desires to drop weight. To help guide you, here are the Food and Nutrition Science Alliances’ “Ten Red Flags of Junk Science“:

• Recommendations that promise a quick fix.
• Dire warnings of danger from a single product or regimen.
• Claims that sound too good to be true.
• Simplistic conclusions drawn from a complex scientific study.
• Recommendations based on a single study.
• Dramatic statements that are refuted by reputable scientific organizations.
• Lists of “good" and “bad" foods.
• Recommendations made to help sell a product.
• Recommendations based on studies published without peer review.
• Recommendations from studies that ignore difficulties among individuals or groups.

Always remember that if it sounds too good to be true, it is. Anything worth doing in your life requires time and effort to achieve and succeed. Run from false promises like the hCG scam. Stick with life-giving whole foods and physical activity. Now, that’s better living through your own chemistry.

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Because the HCG diet combines injections or supplements of the HCG hormone along with severe calorie restriction, you may lose weight — at least for the short term. But it's the calorie restriction that causes the weight loss, not the HCG. In addition, the safety of HCG for weight loss is uncertain, and the hormone hasn't been approved by the Food and Drug Administration as a treatment for obesity or weight control.

HCG is human chorionic gonadotropin, a hormone produced during pregnancy. As a prescription medication, HCG is used mainly to treat fertility issues.

Proponents of the HCG diet say that HCG can help you lose weight, burn fat and redistribute fat away from your buttocks and stomach. On the HCG diet, you either receive injections of HCG or take HCG supplements. The HCG diet also requires you to drastically cut your calorie intake, typically consuming just 500 to 800 calories a day — about one-fourth to one-half of the standard calorie recommendations. The HCG diet is typically offered through weight-loss clinics that say they will provide medical supervision.

Although researchers have studied the HCG diet for years, no high-quality studies have shown that the hormone itself helps weight loss. Following any very low calorie diet is likely to result in weight loss, regardless of taking HCG. And the HCG diet can have drawbacks. Severe calorie restriction can make it hard to meet all of your nutritional needs. And rapid weight loss can lead to gallstones. Also, HCG can cause side effects, including headache, fatigue, irritability and male breast enlargement. And be careful about buying HCG products on the Internet — they might not be what they say they are.

Once you stop the HCG diet, you're likely to regain any weight you lost. The key to permanent weight loss is developing healthy eating and exercise habits — not following fad diets.
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HCG HAS NO KNOWN EFFECT ON FAT MOBILIZATION, APPETITE OR SENSE OF HUNGER, OR BODY FAT DISTRIBUTION.

INDICATIONS AND USAGE

HCG HAS NOT BEEN DEMONSTRATED TO BE EFFECTIVE ADJUNCTIVE THERAPY IN THE TREATMENT OF OBESITY. THERE IS NO SUBSTANTIAL EVIDENCE THAT IT INCREASES WEIGHT LOSS BEYOND THAT RESULTING FROM CALORIC RESTRICTION, THAT IT CAUSES A MORE ATTRACTIVE OR “NORMAL" DISTRIBUTION OF FAT, OR THAT IT DECREASES THE HUNGER AND DISCOMFORT ASSOCIATED WITH CALORIE­ RESTRICTED DIETS.

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Although it may sound like a plausible weight loss plan, the scientific evidence for using hCG is lacking.

In 1995, the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology published an analysis of research showing no benefit of hCG in promoting weight loss. A December 2009 position paper of the American Society of Bariatric Physicians concluded they did not recommend hCG as a weight loss aid.

Quack Watch.org director Stephen Barrett, MD tells WebMD that "scientific studies have demonstrated that hCG injections do not cause weight loss."

He describes the protocol as extreme, nearly impossible to adhere to, and senseless, especially because the clinical trials have demonstrated that hCG is ineffective as a weight loss aid.

Since 1975, the FDA has said that hCG is not a weight loss drug. Keep in mind that the FDA doesn't regulate web sites selling hCG and doesn't oversee whether the hCG product you order is safe, free of contaminants, and in the correct concentration.

Potential Health Risks

Not only will you waste your money on hCG, but there are also potential consequences -- from side effects of the product and self-injections to nutritional deficiencies.

It is virtually impossible to meet your nutritional needs for carbohydrates, protein, fats, and fiber with less than 500 calories per day and the diet will most likely result in vitamin and mineral deficiencies.

Minimum calorie levels are closer to 1200-1500 daily to satisfy hunger, fuel daily activities, and provide all the nutrients you need for good health each day.
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Nanci Hellmich, USA TODAY A popular type of weight-loss products, heavily promoted on the Internet, is fraudulent and illegal, Food and Drug Administration officials say.

HCG weight-loss products that promise dramatic results and claim to be homeopathic are sold as drops, pellets and sprays on the Web, in drugstores and at General Nutrition Centers. They are supposed to be used in combination with a very low-calorie diet of 500 calories a day.

Many of the labels indicate the products contain HCG, or human chorionic gonadotropin, a hormone made by the placenta during pregnancy. The hormone itself is approved as a prescription treatment for infertility and other conditions.

There is no evidence the oral over-the-counter products are effective for weight loss, says Elizabeth Miller, FDA's leader for the Internet and health fraud team. While they may not be dangerous, they're at least "economic fraud," she says.

Because the products do not seem to be "a serious direct health hazard or a serious indirect health hazard," they have been a lower priority for FDA action than other products. Still, Miller says, "they could be subject to enforcement at any time."

One of the issues is the homeopathic label. Homeopathy is an alternative medicine practice of using very small or diluted preparations of medicines or remedies to treat a condition. Miller says, "We are aware of HCG products that claim to be homeopathic, but it is not recognized in the Homeopathic Pharmacopoeia." Therefore, these products "are not recognized by the FDA as homeopathic drugs, so they are unapproved drugs and are illegal," she says.

Miller says HCG began being used for weight loss in the 1950s when a British physician had a theory that it could help people on a near-starvation diet not feel hungry. "Since then, a lot of research and clinical trials debunked that theory."

Samuel Klein of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis agrees: "Data from most randomized controlled trials show that HCG is no better than placebo in achieving weight loss or reducing hunger."

Stephen Barrett, a retired psychiatrist who operates quackwatch.org, says, "The bottom line is there is no reason to think the product works."

Even experts in the supplement industry say the products aren't legal and don't work. Andrew Shao of the Council for Responsible Nutrition, an industry group, says HCG is "not considered a legal dietary ingredient and therefore cannot be sold as a dietary supplement. I am not aware of any scientific evidence that supports its use when taken orally."

Because HCG is a peptide hormone, it would be broken down by the stomach and rendered ineffective, he says. He says the products are mostly sold over the Internet, so it's difficult to track sales.

Kevin Wright, president of HCG Platinum, says his company made HCG products until about two months ago; it stopped because it found a formula that doesn't use the hormone. Some bottles of the HCG formula are still on store shelves, selling for about $70 an ounce.

Many other companies are still selling HCG products, and there are weight-loss clinics that use the prescribed injectable hormone, he says.

FDA's Miller also has concerns about injectable versions of HCG for weight loss. The drug is not approved for weight loss, she says. Dieters getting injections of the hormone from people who aren't licensed to do so run the risk of getting infections and can't be sure what product they're getting.
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Thousands of people are latching onto a diet that promises rapidweight loss—up to 30 pounds a month—and, judging by its recent surge in popularity, actually delivers. But the so-called hCG diet is either a weight-loss miracle or a dangerous fraud, depending on who's talking. The plan combines drops or injections of hCG, a pregnancy hormone, with just 500 calories a day. While some believers are so convinced of its power they'll willingly stick themselves with a syringe, the government and mainstream medical community say it's a scam that carries too many health risks and doesn't lead to long-term weight loss.

"It's reckless, irresponsible, and completely irrational," says Pieter Cohen, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. "Can you lose weight on it? Of course, but that's mainly because you're hardly consuming any calories. And any benefit is not going to last."

HCG is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat infertility in both men and women. But its weight-loss roots trace back to the 1950s, when British endocrinologist A.T.W. Simeons realized that giving obese patients small, regular doses of the hormone helped them lose stubborn clumps of fat. It only worked, however, when coupled with a near-starvation diet. Simeons began touting hCG as a potent appetite suppressant that would make anything more than 500 daily calories unbearable. And he claimed the hormone could blast fat in key trouble spots like the upper arms, stomach, thighs, and buttocks, while preserving muscle. Save for a few tweaks, the modern-day incarnation is largely as Simeons presented it: Dieters supplement an extremely low-calorie meal plan with daily injections prescribed off-label by medical professionals, or take diluted, homeopathic hCG— typically in drop form—sold online, in drugstores, and at nutritional supplement stores.

Exactly why the hCG diet is experiencing a revival now is unclear, but the hype has sparked a response from the FDA. In January, the agency warned that homeopathic hCG is fraudulent and illegal when sold for weight-loss purposes. Though the FDA said such products aren't necessarily dangerous, their sale is deceptive, since there's no good evidence they're effective for weight loss. What's more, all hCG products, including injections prescribed by a doctor, must carry a warning stating there's no proof they accelerate weight loss, redistribute fat, or numb the hunger and discomfort typical of a low-calorie diet.

Nonetheless, doctors are still doling out prescriptions for the daily injections, typically inserted into the thigh. At New Beginnings Weight Loss Clinic in Florida, for example, an in-house physician has prescribed injections to 3,000 clients since 2008, and clinical director Jo Lynn Hansen has recently observed a marked jump in interest. There, clients can opt for either a 23-day plan ($495) or a 40-day regimen ($595). After taking a six week break and eating normally—to prevent the body from becoming "hCG-immune"—many resume the process, completing multiple cycles. "We have people flying in from all over the country," Hansen says. "It's just a tiny little needle that *****s the skin. Anyone can do it."

Though hCG dieters have some leeway in how they spend their 500 daily calories, they're urged to choose organic meats, vegetables, and fish. Dairy, carbs, alcohol, and sugar are all off limits. A day's meals might consist of coffee and an orange for breakfast; a little tilapia and raw asparagus for lunch; a piece of fruit in the afternoon; and crab, spinach, Melba toast, and tea for dinner. If dieters slip up, they're encouraged to compensate by drinking only water and eating nothing but six apples for 24 hours. That's thought to help squeeze ou****er weight, a psychological boost to help them get back on track.

"It wasn't that hard to pull off, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat," raved London-based fashion stylist Alison Edmond in February's Marie Claire. "In the end, I lost a total of 25 pounds, ending up at a weight I hadn't been in 10 years." Despite success stories like hers, scientific evidence on the plan is shaky at best. In 1995, researchers analyzed 14 clinical trials on the hCG diet. Only two concluded hCG was any more effective than a placebo at helping people lose weight. And nearly 10 years earlier, a report in the Canadian Medical Association Journal stated hCG has "no value" as a means of managing obesity, and that the diet has been "thoroughly discredited and thus rejected by the majority of the medical community."