Dr. Mehmet Oz, President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, was pressed during his Senate confirmation hearing Friday about his history of pushing bogus weight-loss methods on his television show.
“In 2012, you enthusiastically recommended several supplements for weight loss on your television show, including a substance called Green Coffee Extract, which we now know was fraudulently marketed,” Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH) said to Oz during the Senate Finance Committee hearing. “Can you confirm that you no longer believe that Green Coffee Extract is a miracle weight-loss drug?”
“I never said that that medication was a miracle weight-loss drug, but I am —” Oz began to respond.
“Can you confirm that this was fraudulently marketed and Green Coffee Extract is not a miracle weight-loss drug? Yes or no?” Hassan said.
“Yes,” Oz replied.
Hassan: “You promoted a supplement called Raspberry Ketones, claiming that it is, ‘a number one miracle in a bottle to burn your fat.’ That’s your quote. Will you confirm for the record today that you no longer believe Raspberry Ketones to be a ‘miracle in a bottle?’”
Oz: “There are many things I said on the show I take great pride in the research we did at the time to identify which of these worked and which ones didn’t. Many of them are still being researched, like the Green Coffee Bean Extract you just mentioned.”
Hassan: “How much were you paid to promote the supplements?”
Oz: “I was paid nothing to promote the supplements.”
Oz has a long history pushing medical methods with thin or untested evidence, such as when he falsely claimed hydroxychloroquine cures COVID-19. This was particularly true with weight-loss drugs, which at times got a boost from exposure on Oz’s popular daytime television program. In 2014, the British Medical Journal said of 80 recommendations on Oz’s show, less than half were supported by evidence.
President Donald Trump in November nominated Oz, a former U.S. Senate candidate, to run CMS, a federal agency that administers Medicare and works with states to dole out Medicaid.
