The world changed when Vinton Cerf and Bob Kahn introduced the internet. It became a new way to send mail, talk to someone across the world with instant messaging, and all the way to now, where we post about our lives for others to see. This is called Social media. Social media has been, for the most part good. It has helped people stay connected around the world, as well as keep people informed with world news. Sometimes, this could result in a bad thing because this is also how fake news is spread. Fake news had led to many false accusations on political figures, death of celebrities, and misinformation being spread about different topics.
Facebook has not been new to the fake news. Facebook is a social media platform, that was created and founded by Mark Zuckerberg in 2004. It has since then become one of the most popular sites. Face has helped a lot of people not only connect but start up their own businesses. One of those businesses is Herbalife.
Herbalife is a multi-level company that sells dietary supplements. It was founded by Mark Hughes in 1980 and uses direct selling, having a consumer of the product be the sales person, technique to sell the product. They became increasingly popular by introducing products that are meant to help lose weight and aid with fitness such as protein shakes, protein bars, teas, aloes, vitamins energy, and hydration. These products followed the upward curve of lifestyle products that were being introduced to the marketplace. More distributors were beginning to pick up the product to sell to others as the internet began to become more accessible to everyone. Once Facebook became a large portion of the internet, marketing became easier than ever before, and Herbalife saw another sharp rise in sales. The company was still consistently growing, gaining new distributors daily thanks to the power of Facebook. Though this all seems positive for the business, many negatives have risen from this growth, including the fact that many believe Herbalife is a “wonder drug” or a cure-all of weight loss.
There have been a few articles that say that Herbalife is a factor in liver disease. Hepatotoxicity is the damage to the liver caused by herbal or dietary supplement. In 2018, a research paper came out to discuss correlations of hepatotoxicity and Herbalife. Initial reports of damaged liver were indicated in Spain and Israel. Now there have been new cases in Switzerland, Latin America, United States, and Iceland. The people who were critically suffering from liver damage, have said that they were all taking Herbalife products, ranging from a month to a year. The reason it was affecting people is, they were taking more than one meal supplement. Of course, they were “self-medicating”, but this is to show that people don’t know that they are putting in their bodies.
Another study, published in 2009, states that the Herbalife products were tested for contamination of drugs, pesticides, heavy metals, and softens. Resulting in finding that a bacterium was present in the product, Bacillus Subtilis. This bacterium is found in water, soil, or decomposing of plant residue. Most of the time, this bacterium is actually ok for humans, but in some low risks it could undergo fermentation, which was the case for these people. In 2008, 6 supplements sold by Herbalife contained high amounts of lead, if taken as directed by package. Herbalife disputed that they were meeting all regulations required and saw nothing wrong with this. The FDA, US Food and Drug Administration, does not approve of Herbalife products because it doesn’t approve anything that has to do with dietary supplements. They do make standards that the company has to follow, and they make inspections of the product, but do not approve it because of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.
Dr. Czys is a very well-known for teaching people how to be healthy. He published an article in 2016, where he reviews Herbalife. He states that a meal replacement shake is not ideal. The only thing people should be replacing a meal with is a healthier meal. In his article her says that Herbalife uses soy protein, which is one of the worst form of protein. It has the highest concentration of saponins. Saponins are anti-nutrients that punch holes in cell walls. The more of them you take, the more damage it’ll cause. People are putting themselves at risk to have a leaky gut, if they take too many supplements. Soy also contains protease inhibitors. Protease is an enzyme that breaks down protein. The inhibitors found in the soy reduce the protein absorption, defeating the whole purpose of a protein shake. There is also the fact that most plants are sprayed with toxic chemicals to kill off the weeds around the soy bean plant. The bean tends to absorb those chemicals. Then, there is fructose, which is an added sugar. Recent studies have shown that fructose is more dangerous than glucose. Finally, we have vitamers and synthetic beta carotene. These are a way to implement the intake of fruits and vegetables. These can increase the risk of lung cancer in smokers. All this information is just for the shake.
He then discusses the multivitamins, which are also filled with vitamers. As I motioned before, these are not healthy whatsoever. The last thing he discusses is the formula 3 cell activator. This is supposed to help mitochondrial function. There is no actual study that shows that this helps with that exactly. Herbalife doesn’t inform which cell are “activated”, how does it improve the mitochondrial function, and what does even mitochondrial function mean? There is nothing to back this up and are just telling people to try it and that it really works.
We also have Laura Ligos, who is a dietitian. She posted an article about Herbalife in 2019. She discusses on the fact of Herbalife still being around even after they were sued in 2017 to back consultants who were promised they would make money, but never made anything in the end. She discusses the shakes and teas. The shakes are just powdered with more powder on top. The FDA does not regulate the supplements going into these shakes and teas, so how can people can continue taking it. She also mentions the documentary on Netflix called “Betting on Zero”. The documentary just better explains what Herbalife is. She then proceeds to talk about the many Herbalife nutrition clubs that keep popping up throughout her city. She explains that they usually have no marketing, except for Facebook pages. The clubs don’t have a single fruit or real food for that matter. These clubs are not allowed to advertise outside the club and they can’t pursue anyone, but once you cross the line it is game over. She states that a few of the people that have gone in have mentioned that they are asked immediately to sign up. The point is to not sell you the products, but to make you a member. The average club loses about $12,000 per year according to the documentary. They promote nothing healthy, they have little to no marketing, and Herbalife won’t even let them be associated with the company. All of these red flags and it makes you wonder, why is this company still alive?
On Facebook, Herbalife markets itself as “making the world happier and healthier.” Their mission is to “Change people’s lives with great nutrition products and a proven business opportunity.” On their main page, they want people to learn on how to become healthy with tips about nutrition and fitness from experts, to give them healthy meal recipes for shakes, and to give them with information about their products. They post a lot of pictures promoting on how to eat healthier. They tend to add real food in these, but somewhere will recommend one of their shakes. They also have a lot of product posts. They tend to ask a lot of polar questions, never open ended. They don’t want to leave room for the customer to think about anything else besides the product in question. Some of their posts with a lot of scientific facts right before they introduce their product, so it looks like there is truth behind the product. In terms of fitness advice, they do have a lot of good advice. They also promote sessions that people can join online. They give out information on why exercise is good, as well as recommendations that dietitians have. They do tend to show a lot of people being in work out gear and looking like they are working out. Herbalife know they are targeting to people who want to look this way.
There are also a ton of Herbalife groups on Facebook. These groups are probably the Herbalife Nutrition independent distributors. These are the people that the customers have to go through to order their product. In almost every post, a Herbalife representative will comment to contact a distributor. A customer is not allowed to order for themselves. As I was looking through the groups on Facebook, the ones that have a distributor’s name on it are all private. They all have almost the same description about each group. They introduce what Herbalife is and what they do propose to do. Some add on that it is to help with sport performance. These groups probably go with the clubs that distributors make in order to get people to join their team.
A Herbalife club is actually very hard to establish because Herbalife has a setoff rules that people must follow. The 2010 Guide that I found on google says that the simple way to social media success is through these 3 things:
- To speak for yourself, not for the company. Meaning don’t act like you are an official spoke person,
- Identify yourself as a distributor.
- Follow good social media etiquette.
They want to want you to stay small and keep it simple by just creating your club on only 2 social media sites, setting aside a few mins a day to post, to link your posts to Herbalife sites only for great resources, don’t just sell because people will feel like you’re invading their space, and to tell people something about your life that you care about like valuable information that can be relatable to the customer. You are only allowed to use materials that Herbalife has provided for you to use. For example, they are not allowed to post just any image with someone holding a product, Herbalife has to approve it. It says to not claim that these products have any medical or curative properties as they don’t prevent anything. They are not allowed to use the Herbalife name on the site or in the email and if you use the Herbalife logo, you have to say that you’re a distributor. I spoke to someone who is a distributor for Herbalife and she kept telling me that she always feels supported and that it feels like she has a family with her community after every question I asked her.
To some people Herbalife is their life. It helped them lose the weight that they wanted. For others, it is entirely a scam because they put a lot of their time and money but get no results. Dietitians don’t like the products because they don’t really make anything healthier. Their products are either powder, a lot of pills, or liquids to add to water. Herbalife uses the personal experiences of their distributors to attract the customer on social medias. They use close ended questions with some already proven science to assure the people that their products are safe and helpful. The thing is it is not even FDA approved or regulated. In these instances, you see how the language of the people is used to manipulate how something is viewed. When in reality, the people should be using products that are proven to be safe by the FDA and doctors or professionals who can back the information. Everyone should look into what they are consuming, otherwise everyone would be taking whatever was available.
Citations:
Best Practices: Using Social Media for Success. (2010). Retrieved from https://www.myherbalife.com/Content/en-US/pdf/distributorForms/2010_SocialMediaGuide_usen.pdf
D’Onofrio, K., & D’Onofrio, K. (2020, January 2). Herbalife ‘Scam’ Weight Loss Product Associated with Fatal Liver Failure. Retrieved from https://www.docwirenews.com/docwire-pick/home-page-picks/herbalife-scam-weight-loss/
Elinav, E., Pinsker, G., Safadi, R., Pappo, O., Bromberg, M., Anis, E., … Shouval, D. (2007, July 26). Association between consumption of Herbalife® nutritional supplements and acute hepatotoxicity. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0168827807003674
FDA’s Letter to Herbalife: Who’s Misleading Whom? (2015, January 7). Retrieved from http://www.fdalawblog.net/2015/01/fdas-letter-to-herbalife-whos-misleading-whom/
Geller, M. (2008, May 20). Group says Herbalife products have too much lead. Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/article/us-this-hold-toni-herbalife/group-says-herbalife-products-have-too-much-lead-idUSN1955645920080520
Herbalife. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/Herbalife/
Herbalife. (2018, April 11). Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK548447/
Herbalife Nutrition. (2020, April 1). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbalife_Nutrition
Herbalife or Herbadeath? (n.d.). Retrieved from https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/herbalife-or-herbadeath/
Herbalife with Alyssa. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/2265148530393924/
Ligos, L. (2020, March 6). Cut the B.S.: Herbalife Nutrition Clubs. Retrieved from https://thesassydietitian.com/cut-the-b-s-herbalife-nutrition-clubs/
Schoepfer, A. M., Engel, A., Fattinger, K., Marbet, U. A., Criblez, D., Reichen, J., … Oneta, C. M. (2007, July 24). Herbal does not mean innocuous: Ten cases of severe hepatotoxicity associated with dietary supplements from Herbalife® products. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0168827807003686
Stickel, F., Droz, S., Patsenker, E., Bögli-Stuber, K., Aebi, B., & Leib, S. L. (2008, October 18). Severe hepatotoxicity following ingestion of Herbalife® nutritional supplements contaminated with Bacillus subtilis. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S016882780800634X
Teschke, R., Frenzel, C., Schulze, J., Schwarzenboeck, A., & Eickhoff, A. (2013, July 27). Herbalife hepatotoxicity: Evaluation of cases with positive reexposure tests. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3724963/
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