Kimkins Diet Scam Goes Down

Scams of any type bother me, but weight loss scams really get on my nerves. Perhaps it's due to my being overweight at one point and knowing how it can affect you both physically and emotionally. So you can imagine my feelings towards this Kimkins diet scam that is ongoing.

For those who may not know the whole story, the Kimkins diet was the brainchild of a woman named Heidi "Kimmer" Diaz. She claimed to have developed a diet that had helped her lose 198 pounds in one year. Sounds pretty good to anyone who is severely overweight, but the problem was that it was just one big lie.

The Kimkins diet plan is unreal when you stop to think about it. This program calls for you to replace fiber intake with laxatives. In addition, instead of the FDA recommended 2,000 calories a day diet for the average woman, it calls for only 500 calories.

To sum it up, you only get 500 calories a day and you also take laxatives every day. Does anyone actually think this is a healthy way to lose weight and live their life?

Is it any wonder that followers of this diet reported having all sorts of medical issues? In fact one of their own employees went to the hospital for chest pains. She also had hair loss and a menstrual cycle that stopped.

What did her employer have to say about it after she raised health concerns over the diet? They immediately fired her!

In a class action suit against Kimkins and Heidi Diaz, 11 former members filed a class action lawsuit.

Among the actions in the suit are allegations that Diaz faked her alleged loss of 198 pounds and is in fact still obese today. Apparently, she used photos of Russian models instead of the actual dieters. It also claims that phony success stories were used on the site, including her own.

Weight loss programs like Kimkins will always be around. Because of the fact that the diet industry is a multi-billion dollar a year market, there will always be some scammers looking to prey on people's emotions and physical challenges. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. I'll be staying up on it and posting any updates.