Lipo This and Lipo That

The product "Lipozene" is being advertised on television these days as a -- you should be able to guess -- a weight loss product. It is one of huge number of weight/fat loss products that uses the morpheme "lipo," which means "fat." As it turns out, Googling "lipo*" brings up a wealth of such products. We are greeted with products that involve injection of a drug into fat deposits (Lipo-Dissolve), application of a cream to the thighs (Reviva Lipo Zyme Thigh Cream), a spray (Now Foods B 12 Lipo Spray) that is applied to foods, a gel (LIPO SCULPT GEL TOPICAL FAT LOSS 8 OZ BODY DEFINING) that, like the cream, is applied to the body. a combo cream and massaging tool (Lipo Reduction Anti-Cellulite Cream & Body Shaping Massager) for the price of $142, as well as a host of pills, caplets, etc.

You will be happy to know that if you buy the combo cream and massager, you will get "discrete shipping." This reminded me when I read it that when I was in junior high school (grades 7-9) I succumbed to a print entreaty to purchase a "spot reducer," which turned out to be a round electrical massager that, of course, did nothing at all except jiggle fat deposits. It too promised discrete shipping. I hid the product in a discrete location in the house and someone discretely lifted it for their own use.

These products all exploit the term "liposuction" by way of suggesting that there is an easier way to go than to have a doctor suck out fat from your bod, a disgusting sounding procedurey. Of this wealth of products, there seems to be one reasonably substantive product, the injectable Lipo-Dissolve, which, it seems, is awaiting FDA approva, something none of the others claim. A process like this has apparently been used for some time in Europe but the US requires more verification of the effectiveness of a drug or procedure before it is approved. I would wait until the FDA says that the procedure works.

I trust that none of you has fallen prey to the unscrupulous makers and advertisers and sellers of these products. Actually, I shouldn't be so optimistic because, at least in the US, we have stores that teem with pills and powders and liquids that when ingested are supposed to provide some health benefit. Someone is clearly buying these products.