An experimental stimulant drug from World War II is emerging according to weight loss and sports supplements sold today, according to a new study.
The stimulant, known as fenpromethamine, was last sold in the 1940s and 1950s as a nasal inhaler called Vonedrine, but has since been withdrawn from the market and, according to the study, published on Tuesday (March 23), never approved for oral use. ) in the journal Clinical toxicology. It is also banned by competitive sports World Doping Agency. The authors appear that the new study is the first to confirm the presence of fenprometamine in supplements.
In addition to fenprometamine, the study identified eight other banned stimulants in sports and weight loss supplements, often combined in different combinations to create ‘cocktails’ of stimulants that have never been studied in humans.
Related: Some ‘brain-strengthening’ supplements contain high levels of unapproved drugs
“It’s really surprising,” said lead author Dr. Pieter Cohen, a general practitioner at the Cambridge Health Alliance and associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, told WordsSideKick. “Finding nine different experimental banned stimulants at the same time was really quite shocking.” The authors found as many as four different stimulants in a single supplement.
The risks associated with ingesting these combinations of stimulants are unknown, and these stimulants are not always listed on the product labels, the authors said.
“The FDA should warn consumers about the presence of cocktails of experimental stimulants in weight loss and sports supplements and take immediate action to remove these stimulants from the market,” the authors wrote in the study.
Prohibited stimulants
The researchers began their study by not looking for fenprometamine, but another stimulant called deterenol. Studies from Europe have found that deterenol-containing supplements, along with other stimulants, are associated with harmful effects in humans, such as nausea, vomiting, chest pain, cardiac arrest and even sudden death. (Deterenol has never been approved for use in the US, and in 2004 the FDA ruled that the stimulant should not be allowed in dietary supplements.)
For the study, they analyzed 17 brands of supplements sold in the US that are labeled as deterenol or a synonym for the drug. These products are usually marketed as weight loss supplements or sports supplements. (A complete list of these supplement brands can be found in the study.)
The researchers found deterenol in 13 of the 17 supplements. The next most common stimulant was fenprometamine, which is found in four of the 17 brands.
Very little information is available on the safety of fenprometamine. When used in the 1940s and 1950s, it was only available as a nasal spray, Cohen said. The consequences of taking the drug, that is how people will take it in a supplement today, are unknown. “If you concentrate it and take it in a pill form, it can have completely different effects,” Cohen said.
Phenpromethamine is not the first stimulant to appear in dietary supplements during World War II. In 2004, after the FDA banned the stimulant ephedra from dietary supplements, manufacturers began adding other experimental stimulants, including 1,3-DMAA, previously marketed as a nasal inhaler in 1948, the authors said. The FDA has since banned 1,3-DMAA for supplements and warns that it could increase the risk of heart problems.
“Once the FDA warns about a stimulant, new ones, there are near variants of it,” Cohen said.
So far, according to the study, the FDA has not issued warnings to consumers about fenprometamine. What’s more, FDA scientists have recently detected deterenol in supplements and published their findings in the journal Drug testing and analysis in September 2020. But even after this discovery, the agency did not issue a warning, despite the supplement banning the agency, Cohen said.
“There is no doubt that the FDA should have acted once they determined [deterenol] was present, “Cohen said. They should warn consumers immediately about deterenol; they should communicate with manufacturers that any supplement containing the stimulant should be removed. ‘
Although the FDA may not have warned about deterenol, the agency has warned about weight loss supplements in general. On his website, the FDA says it has identified an emerging trend of nutritional supplements containing hidden and potentially harmful active ingredients. “Consumers may unknowingly take products that are combined with different quantities of approved prescription drug ingredients, controlled substances and untested and unexamined pharmaceutically active ingredients,” the agency said.
Of the nine stimulants found in the new study, seven – including 1,3-DMAA – have previously been subject to FDA warnings due to their presence in supplements. This finding is consistent with that of a study by Cohen and colleagues in 2018 that found that some dietary supplements still contain experimental stimulants years after the FDA banned them. Live Science reported earlier.
Knowing whether a dietary supplement contains a banned stimulant can be difficult because manufacturers cannot list the drug on the label, or can use a synonym for the drug, Cohen said.
But in general, Cohen advises consumers to avoid two categories of nutritional supplements – those labeled to say they will help you lose weight and those that are if supplements before the workout or muscle building. (The latter category excludes protein powders, which usually contain amino acids and which you do not have to worry about, Cohen excluded.) These categories of supplements can only be considered safe if two things happen: “We reform the law so that the FDA has more enforcement authority. “and the FDA is starting to enforce the law effectively,” Cohen said.
In a statement issued to Live Science, the FDA said it was reviewing the new study. “The FDA is committed to advancing our strategic priorities for nutritional supplements: safety, product integrity and informed decision making. We value studies such as these to raise awareness and pay due attention to these issues,” the statement said.
Originally published on Live Science.