​I was interviewed by VOGUE magazine a year ago. The article by Elizabeth Weil has finally appeared in the January issue on page 112. It is marginally better than the March 2011 article in MORE magazine, but not much. It still retains an unsupported negative view of diet pills. Consider that the title of the article is "A Quick Fix". Moreover, the article is so out-of-date, it doesn’t even mention Qsymia, the FDA-approved combination diet pill.

​The main effect of phentermine is to reduce hunger, but there is a second way in which the med helps dieters. It causes them to feel more awake at night after dinner, so they are less likely to cheat on their diet. If you read The (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty by Dan Ariely, you know that stress and fatigue are the enemies of conscience and good sense.

​I would have thought that by now there would be better diet medicines than phen-pro. Well. Not only are there no better medicines, but phen-pro is almost the only man left standing. They took ephedra and Meridia off the market. The FDA blocked Qnexa and Contrave. Hoodia withered. Public Citizen is even complaining about Alli. Alli! which does no harm and no good.

"Phen-Pro" is the combination of phentermine and a low dose of one of the following: Prozac, Zoloft, Celexa, Luvox , trazadone or Effexor. 

​The phen-pro combination is not FDA approved, although the individual medicines in the combination are approved. Phentermine is approved for the treatment of obesity. Prozac and the other SSRI drugs used in phen-pro are not approved for obesity.