Oprah's Crazy Talk This Week's Cover of Newsweek

[Guest guest]

Live Your Best Life Ever!

Wish Away Cancer! Get A Lunchtime Face-Lift! Eradicate Autism! Turn Back The

Clock! Thin Your Thighs! Cure Menopause! Harness Positive Energy! Erase

Wrinkles! Banish Obesity! Live Your Best Life Ever!

Best Life or Risky Advice?

Things you should know about Oprah's health tips

By Weston Kosova and Pat Wingert | NEWSWEEK

Published May 30, 2009

From the magazine issue dated Jun 8, 2009

In January, Oprah Winfrey invited Suzanne Somers on her show to share her

unusual secrets to staying young. Each morning, the 62-year-old actress and

self-help author rubs a potent estrogen cream into the skin on her arm. She

smears progesterone on her other arm two weeks a month. And once a day, she uses

a syringe to inject estrogen directly into her vagina. The idea is to use these

unregulated " bio-identical " hormones to restore her levels back to what they

were when she was in her 30s, thus fooling her body into thinking she's a

younger woman. According to Somers, the hormones, which are synthesized from

plants instead of the usual mare's urine (disgusting but true), are all natural

and, unlike conventional hormones, virtually risk-free (not even close to true,

but we'll get to that in a minute).

Next come the pills. She swallows 60 vitamins and other preparations every day.

" I take about 40 supplements in the morning, " she told Oprah, " and then, before

I go to bed, I try to remember … to start taking the last 20. " She didn't go

into it on the show, but in her books she says that she also starts each day by

giving herself injections of human growth hormone, vitamin B12 and vitamin B

complex. In addition, she wears " nanotechnology patches " to help her sleep, lose

weight and promote " overall detoxification. " If she drinks wine, she goes to her

doctor to rejuvenate her liver with an intravenous drip of vitamin C. If she's

exposed to cigarette smoke, she has her blood chemically cleaned with chelation

therapy. In the time that's left over, she eats right and exercises, and

relieves stress by standing on her head. Somers makes astounding claims about

the ability of hormones to treat almost anything that ails the female body. She

believes they block disease and will double her life span. " I know I look like

some kind of freak and fanatic, " she said. " But I want to be there until I'm

110, and I'm going to do what I have to do to get there. "

That was apparently good enough for Oprah. " Many people write Suzanne off as a

quackadoo, " she said. " But she just might be a pioneer. " Oprah acknowledged that

Somers's claims " have been met with relentless criticism " from doctors. Several

times during the show she gave physicians an opportunity to dispute what Somers

was saying. But it wasn't quite a fair fight. The doctors who raised these

concerns were seated down in the audience and had to wait to be called on.

Somers sat onstage next to Oprah, who defended her from attack. " Suzanne swears

by bioidenticals and refuses to keep quiet. She'll take on anyone, including any

doctor who questions her. "

That would be a lot of doctors. Outside Oprah's world, there isn't a raging

debate about replacing hormones. Somers " is simply repackaging the old,

discredited idea that menopause is some kind of hormone-deficiency disease, and

that restoring them will bring back youth, " says Dr. Nanette Santoro, director

of reproductive endocrinology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and head of

the Reproductive Medicine Clinic at Montefiore Medical Center. They just don't

need as much once they get past their childbearing years. Unless a woman has

significant discomfort from hot flashes—and most women don't—there is little

reason to prescribe them. Most women never use them. Hormone therapy can

increase a woman's risk of heart attacks, strokes, blood clots and cancer. And

despite Somers's claim that her specially made, non-FDA-approved bioidenticals

are " natural " and safer, they are actually synthetic, just like conventional

hormones and FDA-approved bioidenticals from pharmacies—and there are no

conclusive clinical studies showing they are less risky. That's why

endocrinologists advise that women take the smallest dose that alleviates

symptoms, and use them only as long as they're needed.

" It completely blew me away that Oprah would go to her for advice on this

topic, " says Pearson, the executive director of the nonprofit National

Women's Health Network and an authority on hormone therapy. " I have to say, it

diminished my respect. "

Somers says it's mainstream doctors who need to get their facts straight. " The

problem is that our medical schools do not teach this, " she said in a February

interview with NEWSWEEK. She believes doctors, scientists and the media are all

in the pocket of the pharmaceutical industry. " Billions are spent on marketing

drugs, and these companies also support academic research. " Free from these

entanglements, Somers can see things clearly. " I have spent thousands of hours

on this. I've written 18 books on health. I know my stuff. "

On Oprah's show, there is one opinion more equal than others; and by the end of

the program there was no doubt where Oprah herself stood on the issue. She told

her audience that she found Somers's bestselling books on bioidentical hormones

" fascinating " and said " every woman should read " what she has to say. She didn't

stop there. Oprah said that although she has never had a hot flash, after

reading Somers she decided to go on bioidenticals herself. " After one day on

bioidentical estrogen, I felt the veil lift, " she wrote in O, The Oprah

Magazine. " After three days, the sky was bluer, my brain was no longer fuzzy, my

memory was sharper. I was literally singing and had a skip in my step. " On the

show, Oprah had her own word of warning for the medical establishment: " We have

the right to demand a better quality of life for ourselves, " she said. " And

that's what doctors have got to learn to start respecting. "

All in all, it was a perfect hour of tabloid television. Who could look away

from Suzanne Somers's sad but captivating efforts to turn back time? And if

there was a stab of guilt in the pleasure we took in the spectacle, Oprah was

close by to ease our minds, to reassure us, with the straightest face, that it

was all in the name of science and self-improvement. Oprah routinely grabs

viewers with the sort of tales of the strange and absurd that might be found a

few clicks over on Maury Povich or Jerry Springer: women who leave their

husbands for other women (another recent Oprah episode); a 900-pound mom

(ditto). But there is a difference. Oprah makes her audience feel virtuous for

gaping at the misfortunes of others. What would be sniffed at as seamy on Maury

is somehow praised as anthropology on Oprah. This is Oprah's special brilliance.

She is a gifted entertainer, but she makes it seem as though that is beside the

point. Oprah is not here to amuse you, she is here to help you. To help you

understand your feelings; drop those unwanted pounds; look and feel younger; get

your thyroid under control; to smooth your thighs, nip and tuck your wrinkles,

awaken your senses and achieve spiritual tranquillity so that you can at last be

free to " Live Your Best Life. "

Oprah takes these things very seriously. They are, after all, the answers she

hopes to find for herself. If Oprah has an exquisite ear for the cravings and

anxieties of her audience, it is because she shares them. Her own lifelong quest

for love, meaning and fulfillment plays out on her stage each day. In an age of

information overload, she offers herself as a guide through the confusion.

More at http://www.newsweek.com/id/200025