News about LIghter Life diets emerges today about Coronation Street star Denise Welch and an advert for the company that has been banned by the ASA.

Frankly the Lighter Life company don't seem to be bothered. In fact Denise Welch talks about her weight loss and defends the advert despite the fact it is encouraging you to lose weight in a very unhealthy way indeed...

A report in The Guardian explained:

An advert for the weight loss programme LighterLife featuring former Coronation Street and Loose Women star Denise Welch has been banned after the actor lost weight more quickly than regulations deem to be safe.

Welch attacked the ruling, saying weight loss companies were “trying to help people, and yet they aren’t even allowed to tell us what they can do for us”.

The social media page featured before and after images of the actor and said: “Denise lost two stone in just two months.”

Responding to a complaint challenging whether the ad complied with rules on weight-loss advertising, LighterLife described Welch as overweight with a “very high” waist circumference when she began her programme, adding that she was at high risk of health problems.

The company said Welch lost more than 2lb (around 90g) a week while on the programme.

But it said that Welch’s rate of weight loss was in line with expected results for those on a very low calorie diet (VLCD) programme and, while the rate was greater than 2lb a week, this did not mean that it was incompatible with good medical and nutritional practice.

The company said National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) guidelines stated that a diet of less than 600kcal a day should be used only under clinical supervision, but the minimum daily intake for those on a VLCD LighterLife programme was greater than 600 kcal and those who required medical supervision received it, in line with company policy.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) noted that the Committee of Advertising Practice code stated that claims for an individual to have lost an exact amount of weight must be compatible with good medical and nutritional practice.

The ASA said: “We understood that Denise Welch had been classed as overweight when her weight loss programme began and also that her waist circumference was very high, which put her at high risk of health problems.

Are you aware that many celebrities who have DVDs for weight loss or work for diet companies EAT and Put on Weight first ?!

It's just shocking that people buy into products such as this. Losing weight in this way doesn't work in the long term. You put it all back on and statistics show that you often put more on than you started with. The thing is that people say how great it is that they are losing weight as if it is a surprise. You are taking in only 600 calories a day! of course you are losing weight and damaging your health for nothing at all. I work with people helping them to lose weight and if they come to me on any of these low calorie diets then I explain that I can't work with them because if you just want to lose the weight you put on over years in a few weeks then you are looking at it the wrong way. Although I am a Clinical Hypnotherapist I am not doing anything incredible when I work on weight loss...just helping people to eat more healthily, end emotional eating and exercise more. That's it.

You may need help to motivate you to do those things but if you do them you will lose weight...over the long term...and keep it off. Please don't be suckered into giving the diet industry more money. They wouldn't have a good business if it worked because you would only ever go on one diet in your life wouldn't you?!