Acai Health Watch

Canadian television has notified viewers that certain acai berry products, including acai weight loss and anti-aging supplements are impure, and that they contain trace elements of slidenafil, also known as the prescription drug Viagra.  Many of these acai products are available for purchase throughout North America through the Internet.  Serious side effects can occur when Viagra is combined with other medications, so steer clear of these products until we have more information.

• Anti-Aging Acai Berry
• Guarana Blast
• Brazilian Pure
• Anti-aging Vital Rez V
• Weight Loss VitalAcai
• Dietary Supplement Acai Power Blast
• Muscle Mass

CTV News | Health Canada warns against using certain acai products.

This article makes some interesting points about the nutritional aspects of acai berry juices, the way acai products are marketed, and the unsustainable farming practices.  It suggests that acai is largely a “Girl from Ipanema” fantasy and that the nutritional value is mostly fabrication or spin.  Acai, it suggests, is simply part of a marketing trend involving products from faraway lands such as noni, goji berries and mangosteen.

Certainly there are unscrupulous players in the acai berry supplement industry, but the article makes blanket statements about the superfruits as a whole.  Are the health benefits received by acai consumers worldwide just the claims of people who “have been had?”

“In truth, what we’re guzzling by the gallon is masterful marketing. Rather than being a “global wonderberry,” acai might better be described as an overhyped jungle juice that’s no better for your health than the average orange. Instead of the happy tale of the little berry that could, the acai phenomenon is really just the latest example of how time and time again we turn off our brains and open our wallets when we’re presented with a bottle of exotic “superfruit” juice that’s been packaged as some kind of shortcut to immortality.

In other words, we’ve been had.”

Pulp Fiction – Page 1 – MSN Health & Fitness – Nutrition.