Herbalife - a drug addiction?

[Type941]

Help me out guys. What's the deal with Herbalife? I know it's a network marketing scheme to sucker people out of money, but from a medical stand point - how dangerous is the stuff they sell? Does anyone have any experience with it? A friend of mine recently got into it, drinking the stuff every day, and now 'converting' others. she's a doctor too, which is the part that's troubling. The stories about this Herbalife range from it's all crazy talk and it's safe to 'it contains powerful drugs that initiate immune system, have adverse effects on kidneys and causes risk of cancer and heart attack'. What to believe? I know there was a campaign against it on internet, etc, but that mainly is to to with the financial scheme of the operation. I don't care about that. What I'm wrorried about is can this stuff actually be harmful to your healtH? I know in Russia, the local 'FDA' equivalent doesn't allow it for sale. i heard it's the same in Sweden, and that there are restrictions on it in the US.

I've planning to give the 'stuff' to a government lab for testing, to see if it's harmful, but that's a bit desperate as I don't know what i should be looking for.

can someone share some insight on it - i know we have some very intelligent people here...