Fat blockers named Xenical or Olistat will now be available as an over-the-counter medication called Alli. The use of fat blockers guarantees the user gastrointestinal symptoms such as diarrhea and excessive gas and bloating.

Fat blockers are one of the worst concepts ever to come out of the research labs of pharmaceutical companies. Fat is essential to human health and the use of fat blockers will create many health concerns.

Because the public has been misinformed about the connection between eating fat and weight gain, on the surface, fat blockers seem like a good idea. Eating too many calories, whether from protein, carbohydrates or fats is the main cause of weight gain. For some, it’s simply eating too many carbohydrates.

Xenical, aka Orlistat has been given to many patients who are without the discipline to eat less food as if it were a magic pill. Fat blockers will cause unwanted gastrointestinal symptoms in almost all cases. The reason for this is undigested fats passing through the small intestine without being broken down (digested) in a specific amount of time will begin to spoil and cause the creation of gas. Additional symptoms include diarrhea, greasy stools and leakage. This will happen everyday the fat blocker is taken.

We have know of this problem because of its frequency in patients who have had their gall bladder removed. The gall bladder is a muscular storage sack to hold the liver produced digestive enzyme called bile. When the body senses the presence of fat in food, bile is squeezed into the food as it enters the small intestine.

Without a gall bladder, the liver still produces bile, but secretes small amounts into the small intestine 24 hours each day. Not only can this be irritating to the small intestine, but there will never be enough quantity of bile to assist the digestion of the fat content of any average meal. Patients without their gall bladder historically suffer from excess gas and diarrhea. The answer for those without a gall bladder is to take a digestive enzyme with each meal to assist in the timely digestion of fats.

Avoidance of fats is not the solution because of the importance of fat in many biochemical function in the human body.

For those overweight, the solution is not the avoidance of fats or attempting to block them. A very low fat vegetarian diet or a low carbohydrate/good fats diet or eating less is the solution for weight loss.