FTC Stops False Claims about Fountain of Youth
Oral Sprays
By FTC News
Oct
19, 2005, 22:46
Sprays Do Not Contain, or Cause the Body to
Produce, Human Growth Hormone as Claimed
At the request of the Federal
Trade Commission, a federal court issued a temporary restraining order against
marketers of oral sprays that supposedly contain human growth hormone (HGH) to
stop them from making alleged false and deceptive claims and from sending
illegal spam. The temporary restraining order also freezes the defendants'
assets. The FTC charged that the sprays, marketed on dozens of Web sites and
through spam, do not cause weight loss, reverse the aging process, or prevent
or treat diseases as advertised.
The
FTC alleged in a complaint that the sprays do not contain HGH or cause the
body to produce it. The complaint charged that the defendants made
false and deceptive product claims, misrepresented the security of their
online ordering pages, and sent hundreds of thousands of illegal spam messages
advertising the sprays. The defendants are Pacific Herbal Sciences, Inc. and
its president, John A. Brackett, Jr., and Natural Health Product, Inc. and New
Star Marketing Group, Inc. and their president, Lei Lu, also known as Lei Li,
also doing business as IE Marketing, Inc.
According to the FTC complaint,
the advertisements for "HGH Revolution" and "Natural Rejuvenator HGH-R" made
incredible claims such as:
"LOSE WEIGHT WHILE YOU SLEEP
without DIETING or EXERCISE"
"Experience up to an 82%
IMPROVEMENT in body fat loss while erasing 10 YEARS in 10 WEEKS!"
The marketing pitches for the
sprays referred to clinical studies and prestigious publications to give
credibility to their claims.
In its complaint, the FTC alleged
the defendants made false claims about their products, lacked substantiation
for those claims, and falsely stated that scientific studies validate their
claims. Specifically, the defendants' ads made false or misleading claims that
the sprays:
* contained HGH or increased the
body's production of HGH;
* caused users to lose weight,
without dieting or exercise;
* would turn back or slow the
aging process, including increasing strength and energy, restoring the size of
"bodily organs that shrink with age," and improving memory; and
* would prevent, treat, or cure
diseases and medical conditions, such as strengthening the immune system,
lowering blood pressure, lowering cholesterol, increasing bone density,
improving vision, quickening healing from injuries, acting as an
antidepressant, and stabilizing mood swings.
The defendants also claimed their
Web site ordering pages were secure, saying, "NOTE: To ensure your personal
privacy, all of the information that you submit to us after this point will be
secured using SSL encryption technology." The FTC charged that the Web sites
were not, in fact, encrypted, and consumer information transmitted was not
secure.
The FTC alleged that the
defendants drove traffic to their Web sites through spam, sent by marketers
they paid. Consumers forwarded more than 200,000 of these e-mails to the FTC
in 18 months. The FTC's complaint contends that much of the defendants' email
violated the CAN-SPAM Act by using falsified headers and deceptive subject
headings; leaving out an Internet-based mechanism to opt-out of receiving
future e-mails; and omitting required information, including the sender's
physical postal address, identification of the e-mail as an advertisement or
solicitation, and an opportunity to decline receiving further e-mails from the
sender.
The FTC is seeking a permanent
ban on the defendants' false and misleading claims and illegal spam, as well
as money back for consumers.
The Commission vote authorizing
the staff to file the complaint was 4-0. The complaint was filed under seal in
the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California on October 6,
with an ex parte temporary restraining order and asset freeze granted on the
same day.
NOTE: The Commission files a
complaint when it has "reason to believe" that the law has been or is being
violated, and it appears to the Commission that a proceeding is in the public
interest. The complaint is not a finding or ruling that the defendant has
actually violated the law. The case will be decided by the court.
Copies of the complaint are
available from the FTC's Web site at http://www.ftc.gov and also from the
FTC's ConsumerResponseCenter,
Room 130, 600
Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington,
D.C.20580.
The FTC works for the consumer to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair
business practices in the marketplace and to provide information to help
consumers spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint in English or
Spanish (bilingual counselors are available to take complaints), or to get
free information on any of 150 consumer topics, call toll-free, 1-877-FTC-HELP
(1-877-382-4357), or use the complaint form at http://www.ftc.gov. The FTC
enters Internet, telemarketing, identity theft, and other fraud-related
complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to
hundreds of civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and
abroad.
Growth Hormone Products Don`t
Contain Enough Ingredients
A
new report by ConsumerLab.com says that many supplements that claim to boost
levels of human growth hormone (hGH) actually contain only trace amounts of
the substances needed to achieve this. Dr Tod Cooperman and colleagues
reviewed the ingredients of around a dozen products that claim to boost hGH
levels. These supplements typically fell into three categories: products that
contain amino acids designed to temporarily boost hGH, homeopathic hGH
products that contain an extremely diluted amount of the hormone, and
"nanogram-strength" hGH, which contains roughly 1/1000th of the
prescription-strength dose of the hormone. After reviewing the ingredients of
the supplements Cooperman et al found that all contained nowhere near the dose
of amino acid or hGH needed to have the effect of boosting hGH levels. Cooperman
also says that the way these products
are administered, for example orally or by a nasal spray, makes it impossible
for the body to absorb what little of the hormone is there. Such hGH
supplements are sold with the promise that the products will produce the same
effects as when hGH is injected directly into a vein, however that is clearly
not the case.
Growth hormone is a protein; it is
destroyed if given by mouth. Even so, knowing that injections aren’t popular
people began to market sprays, sprays that do not work. They are either
homeopathic or they are sublingual amino acids.
Before we get in to how Homeopathy
works or more how it doesn’t. I just want to mention that nowhere in Dr.
Klatz’s Book Grow Young With HGH does he mention (or any other
expert) anything about homeopathic products. Yet the people who are selling
homeopathic product quote his book. He does, however go in to great detail
about amino acids and how they work through oral dosages, Not Sprays. All the
studies that have been done use real hGH or amino acids to help release hgh.
Homeopathy was created by Dr. Samuel Hahnemann
(1755–1843) on the assumption that like can be cured by like. “Like cures
like” in some ways is like a vaccination. He
developed his "law of similars" -- a notion that symptoms of disease can be
cured by extremely small amounts of substances that produce similar symptoms
in healthy people when administered in large amounts. Now here is how it
works, if the original substance is soluble, one part is diluted with either
nine or ninety-nine parts of distilled water and/or alcohol and shaken
vigorously (succussed); if insoluble, it is finely ground and pulverized in
similar proportions with powdered lactose (milk sugar). One part of the
diluted medicine is then further diluted, and the process is repeated until
the desired concentration is reached. Dilutions of 1 to 10 are designated by
the Roman numeral X (1X = 1/10, 3X = 1/1,000, 6X = 1/1,000,000). Similarly,
dilutions of 1 to 100 are designated by the Roman numeral C (1C = 1/100, 3C =
1/1,000,000, and so on). Most remedies today range from 6X to 30X, but
products of 30C or more are marketed. A 30X dilution means that the
original substance has been diluted 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
times. Here is an example: Imagine placing a drop of red dye into such a
container so that it disperses evenly. Homeopathy's "law of infinitesimals" is
the equivalent of saying that any drop of water subsequently removed from that
container will possess an essence of redness. The principles underlying the
concept of potentizing (diluting) are highly questionable and deserve nothing
but ruthless scrutiny.
On March
3, 1998,
at a symposium sponsored by Good Housekeeping magazine, former FDA
Commissioner David A. Kessler, M.D., J.D., acknowledged that homeopathic
remedies do not work but that he did not attempt to ban them because he
felt that Congress would not support a ban.
Bill Phillips said,“Sublingual Amino
Acids – The contention here is that sublingual amino acids will be absorbed
more quickly, thus, increasing blood concentrations more effectively. Once
again, this has never been shown to be true. To my knowledge, there are no
studies looking at sublingual amino acid delivery. If you look at it from a
strictly biological point of view, amino acids are rather large molecules with
very poor lipid solubility and are probably not absorbed very well at all
sublingually. Not only that, but typically effective dosages of even
important free-form amino acids, such as glutamine and taurine, in gram
quantities.”(Sports Supplement Review.)
Sources:
Sports Supplement Review
www.reutershealth.com
foodconsumer.org
Carl-Erik Boman Chemist and Ph.D.
Stephen Barrett, M.D.