Chitosan, the favorite fat blocker of late night television advertisements, has graced the shelves of health stores for some time now. Chitosan has even spawned a book (The Fat Blocker Diet, by Arnold Fox and Brenda Adderly), trumpeting its wondrous fat-burning powers.
So what is Chitosan?
Well, it's a fiber supplement derived from the shells of crustaceans. Apparently, Chitosan had the amazing ability to bind with fat (we've all seen the demonstrations on the infomercials), and prevent it from being absorbed into the body. Once again, it appeared like the miracle weight loss drug had been discovered. Eat what you want, and lose all the weight you want... the dieter's dream, right?
Well, as you may have guessed. there is a catch. The initial studies on the effectiveness of chitosan were performed on animals. In all fairness, they did seem to indicate a fat-absorbing tendency.
But as we've seen many times before, making the "jump" from animals to humans without adequate testing and verification does not always prove fruitful.
And therein lies the rub...
Smelling the truckloads of dollars waiting to be harvested, numerous manufacturers began producing and advertising this "fat blocker supplement", without any corroboration of beneficial effects in humans. They also began to seriously exaggerate the claims of their product's effectiveness. Before long, this got them into hot water with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (The FTC has since taken action against several big-name manufacturers -- click here for details one such action and click here for details on another).
In the wake of this, obesity researcher Dr. Judy Stern (cofounder of the American Obesity Association, member of the obesity task force of the National Institute of Health), from the University of California, Davis was recruited to do a study into the "fat blocking" effectiveness of this controversial supplement. What did she find? Contrary to results garnered in animal studies, Dr. Stern concluded Chitosan didn't block fat absorption... not even a tiny little bit. And this study was the most intensive ever conducted.
Carefully documenting what went into and what came out of the test subjects (that's putting it delicately, this was not a pleasant task!), Dr. Stern was able to establish that Chitosan had NO ability to bind with fat and eliminate it from the body. Of course, lawyers for the manufacturers of Chitosan-based products are contesting the study's results. Unfortunately for them, Dr. Stern's credibility as a researcher means there's little hope they'll be successful.
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