photo (c) Breno Peck

The Acai-Berry Craze

Visit any website about health today and you will likely see an advertisement about, “Dr. Oz, acai berries, or the Oprah show.” There is a new acai berry craze coming all over the internet.  In fact, this craze is getting so bad that people are actually starting to deprive the native Brazilians of the berries in their rain forests.

What is so special about these berries? The answer is nothing. Research has shown them to be like most fruits. They are antioxidants, but scored lower in antioxidant potency than many common fruits including, strawberry and grapes. The acai powders and acai juices are the same, they are no better than common fruits and vegetables.

If you live in Brazil than it might be good to eat some berries every now and again. But if you don’t, than you are only wasting your money. There are many other great, healthy foods. Go enjoy some fresh strawberries or grapes.

Scam Alert

Most of these ‘miracle berry cure’ websites will offer you a free trial, beware! In the tiny print of the terms and conditions you will see that they are going to begin charging you a monthly subscription.  What is even worse is that some of these websites will only let you cancel your surprise subscription by phone. In rare cases they won’t even answer the phone number printed on their site and people have had to cancel their credit cards.

Here is a report on acai berries by the Better Business Bureau: http://www.bbb.org/us/article/8493

The acai berries picture was taken by Breno Peck, his profile can be found here: