Facebook Users Recruit Friends For Diet, Supplement Programs — But Is It Legit?

Last winter, Natalie Vargas was nearing her mid-30s, eating fast food for lunch, drinking about nine cups of coffee a day, and feeling exhausted and sick to her stomach. But all of that changed in April 2015, when she began following a program she heard about on Facebook from a friend who had been struggling with similar issues.

125/month weight loss and cleanse program she purchased through Plexus. The company is one of countless that uses multi-level marketing (MLM)— a trend that experts say has helped fuel the U.S. 64 billion value, the latest data available from research firm Marketdata Enterprises. Many people will learn about these programs through friends on social media who are then compensated by the company whose products they’re promoting— the basis of MLM, or network marketing.

But due to flexible federal regulation of weight loss products and their often obscure ingredients, many registered dietitians question whether these programs offer more than what can be attained through a traditional healthy lifestyle. Others worry some may be Ponzi schemes that could leave participants not only sicker— but also broker— than when they started.

Can you really “detox” the body? Gershon, who studies the bowel’s relationship with the nervous system, said the bacterium in the body’s colon lining plays a fundamental role in digestion and nourishment. For example, cellulose, a component of fiber found in leafy greens like lettuce and spinach, can’t be digested by the body without the delicate balance of bacterium that self-regulates in the colon.

When the colon absorbs toxins— by way of exposure to a foodborne illness like salmonella or cholera, for instance— the body becomes nauseated and vomits to try to rid itself of that toxin. In foods that are safe to eat, toxins aren’t absorbed. The body flushes them naturally. “One way to avoid a toxin is don’t eat it,” Gershon said.

Taking any supplement in excess has the potential to have the opposite of its desired effect— that is, overloading on supplements may intoxicate the body, said Samantha Heller, a senior clinical nutritionist at New York University’s Langone Medical Center. Heller, a registered dietitian for nearly two decades, referred to Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling’s 1969 theory that vitamin C was a “miracle” supplement that could cure the common cold and extend people’s life spans.

Following that belief, which has been debunked multiple times but is still popularly held today, people began taking too much vitamin C, causing the vitamin to transform from a disease-fighting antioxidant to a pro-oxidant, Heller said. ] works closely with vitamin E and selenium to balance the body’s system, so too much of one or the other can really knock it off.

“We don’t know what large doses of these supplements may do to our bodies,” Heller said. Can supplements help you lose weight? Popular programs like Plexus, as well as Isagenix, AdvoCare and Arbonne, call for taking supplements, either in pill or powder form, and some version of fasting from whole foods. Heller said some of the products for these programs also contain laxatives.

“Looking at the long lists of ingredients in these products, one wonders, ‘Why not just eat real food, where Mother Nature has created the perfect balance of nutrients for the body? Isagenix, a company that has about 230,000 likes on Facebook, has a whole catalog of packages not only for weight loss, but for performance enhancement and energy, among other solutions. Whether it’s helpful at all to supplement a healthy, balanced diet with any vitamins and minerals in the first place is unclear, registered dietitians say.

Although sales of supplements have led to the growth of a multibillion dollar industry, the science behind whether they’re helpful or harmful— or do nothing at all— is fuzzy. Some experts say individuals could benefit from taking a vitamin D supplement, Heller noted, but the popular belief that vitamin B12 can offer an energy boost is a myth because the body excretes the vitamin before fully absorbing it.

A big reason why companies can say their products may have certain benefits lies in terms laid out by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Since 1994, when Congress passed the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act, supplements— whether sold individually or bundled in weight loss packages— have been freed of regulation from the FDA.

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