Trudeau In Hot Water

As many of you know, Kevin Trudeau is not someone I look to for sound nutritional advice and knowledge.

If this is your first time at the Small Bites blog, please click on the "Kevin Trudeau" link on the right-hand side of the main page and enjoy my various "Shame on You" postings in which I take great pleasure in deconstructing his New York Times bestseller Natural Cures "They" Don't Want You To Know About.

Although I have received 92 e-mails over the past few months from readers who love the section and share their own impressions of the book, I have also received a few strongly worded missives from fervent Trudeau supporters who tell me "I just don't get it."

Well, I think it's Mr. Trudeau who just doesn't get it. In case you haven't heard, the Federal Trade Commission is breathing down his neck again, this time for misrepresenting claims in his latest book, Weight Loss Cure "They" Don't Want You To Know About (which I was planning tackling after I got through Natural Cures...)

Turns out Trudeau calls his weight-loss plan "easy to follow" and "safe", yet "in court documents, the FTC pointed out that one required phase of the protocol requires that consumers get daily injections of a prescription drug that is not approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration for weight loss."

It gets better! "To obtain the drug, a consumer would need to either go overseas, or find a doctor in the U.S. who will prescribe the drug for off-label use. The injections must be intramuscular, and Trudeau even instructs the dieter to do the injections under the care of a licensed physician. Besides the injections, this phase also requires a 500 calorie/day diet for 21 to 45 days, and the consumer cannot use any medicines, including over-the-counter and prescription drugs, most cosmetics, and no creams, lotions, or moisturizers."

Five hundred calories a day? Okay, allow me to give you some perspective. People imprisoned at Nazi concentration camps were fed approximately 800 calories a day. Think about that. Someone is telling you to go on a diet and consume less food than a victim of the Holocaust. Apart from being completely disturbing, it also goes to show you how unhealthy (and potentially lethal!) some of these ludicrous diets are.

Two big thumbs up to the hard working people at the Federal Trade Commission!