Diet pills, supplements, anorectic drugs and other weight loss medications will not melt away fat and solve weight problems. Anti-obesity drugs operate through suppressing one’s appetite, increasing the body’s metabolism or a combination of the two.

Some pills, such as Dexadrine or Fen-Phen, carry a strong risk of high blood pressure, palpitations, dependency or insomnia. Diet pills like Dexadrine contain dangerous amphetamines that have effects similar to drugs such as speed and cocaine. A new study from researchers at Yale University found that pills like Dexadrine and Acutrim may increase the odds of having a stroke 16-fold.

Most weight loss trials show that diet pills offer, at best, short-term support. A report by the National Institutes of Health found that virtually 100 percent of the people who took Fen-Phen put back all the weight they lost when they stopped. This only proves that people should adopt healthy habits instead of turning to hazardous diet pills.