Longevity Activator is a supplement sold by info scammer “Dr” Ryan Shelton. Shelton peddles a number of Internet-based cures that he peddles, including the Hair Revital X, Join FLX, SoundQuility, SouthBeach Skin Lab, Diabetes 60, Vision 20, and fertility treatments, among other things. Ryan Shelton is not a medical doctor but a naturopath who holds himself out as a physician. He’s notorious for the overpriced and dubious supplements that he sells on a number of websites. Longevity Activator is a supplement that he claims will let users “Opt Out” of Aging and Reclaim Your Youth & Vitality.” Don’t buy it. By which we mean, don’t buy his pitch and definitely don’t buy his product. Here’s why:
Who Is Ryan Shelton, and Should You Trust Him?
Over the past 10 years, Shelton has moved around the U.S. frequently and appears to currently have practices in “sun-soaked” Hawaii as well as having a presence in Australia. The Zenith Laboratories that he is listed as the medical director of this Illinois-based supplement vendor, although Shelton has no medical practice in that state. The Zenith Labs website states: “between his best-selling books and his medical practice in Hawaii, Dr. Ryan has helped hundreds of thousands of men & women…” A search on Amazon Books finds no book authored or sold by Ryan Shelton. Similarly, a search of the Library of Congress shows no book by Shelton. Even Google comes up snake eyes. Not only has Shelton not published any books, but whatever ebooks he has sold on the Internet can hardly be called “best selling”. Why does Zenith Labs lie about its medical director’s publishing record?
Over those 10 years, Shelton has been developing an Internet marketing machine to sell supplements that purport to cure obesity, tinnitus, vision impairment, premature aging, diabetes, joint health, heart disease, and digestive diseases. Ever hear about the now-discredited Spark Health Media? Shelton was involved in that. If you’ve stumbled across Zenith Labs, you’ll find a host of cure-alls for just about anything that ills you. While some of what Shelton preaches is scientifically validated common sense, his sites are really all about trying to sell you overpriced pills that will likely not cure you any better than a placebo. So, let’s take a closer look at “Dr” Shelton and get to the bottom of what he’s actually selling consumers and whether we can recommend your buying ANYTHING from this notorious Internet infoscammer.
Some Flashing Red Lights
“Dr.” Shelton has decided to use the Internet to peddle his potions and creams. While that’s not a crime, what are the sketchy methods he uses to sell those products. Shelton hires copywriters to compose lengthy (and undocumented) stories about his marvelous concoctions. These marketing pitches are hallmarks of the infoscammers that we’ve chronicled at this blog. Infoscammers, in essence, find ways to misrepresent or overprice medical cures that are readily available for free or low-cost to most all Americans. Worse yet, Shelton has relied upon affiliate marketers to promote his products — and that’s downright misleading. These affiliates claim to have “reviewed” the products, but actually they are paid commissions for every consumer they’ve lured to Shelton’s company. Most all of the reviews are identical; they’ve been largely written by professional copywriters to trick consumers that happen upon their “review sites” into thinking that the product has been throughly tested by the reviewer. In fact, they aren’t.
Shelton is Exploiting the Well-Known Placebo Effect
The idea that your brain can convince your body a fake treatment is the real thing. It’s referred to as the placebo effect and has been around for as long as humans have attempted to heal other humans. However, scientists have been able to actually document how placebos work and have found that in some cases a placebo can be just as effective as traditional treatments. Infoscammers rely upon this effect to help them sell their questionable supplements. Whether it be pills or diets or lifestyle changes, almost half of the people who buy into these schemes are likely to experience some degree of relief due to the placebo effect. Sadly, Shelton’s Longevity Activator exploits the placebo effect. In short, as many as 50% of the people who buy these useless pills are likely to feel some effect. And, once hooked, they’ll be faithfully buying Shelton’s shady, overpriced pills for a long time.
How Shelton Uses Scammer Buzz Words to Sell His Product
A key giveaway in these Interest scams is how they prey upon people’s distrust. In his ads for Longevity Activator, Shelton shamelessly pushes the distrust button:
“In fact, most people living in America today have been swindled, cornered, and forced into living with poor health by government scandals tricking them into believing in the standard American diet.”
“The government has been feeding you a dangerous lie since the day you were born in an effort to line their own pockets.“
“Here’s the part they DON’T tell you…Our bodies are pushed to their breaking point with toxic pesticides hidden in our produce, brain-damaging chemicals dissolved in our water, and the calorie-rich nutrient-blank “frankenfoods” lining the shelves of your local supermarkets”
“The high carb, low-fat diet pushed on us by the FDA and other big letter agencies is one of the biggest lies of this century, and it’s destroying your telomeres….because most of our carbs, such as corn, wheat and other grains, are either farmed by government corporations or controlled by government corporations.”
“I’ve seen fat cat CEO’s purposely disguising failed research studies and paying off scientists to recreate documents to show positive results – then turn around and sell you worthless, and dangerous, supplements simply to line their own greedy pockets with your hard-earned cash…”
One can argue to what extent government is complicit in promoting questionable health information. However, infoscammers attempt to make government the “enemy” and they hammer on conspracies about government and “big pharma” cover-ups and often include the language about what they “don’t want you to know”.
Longevity Activator Pitch Touts Telomeres
Infoscammers love to sell life-extension supplements because it is literally impossible to prove that any inert supplement does not extend life. Shelton’s slick website claims he can “prove beyond the shadow of a doubt” that it’s possible to “slow down the aging process”. He talks about being able to “transform your DNA” by using an enzyme called telomerase. Like most info scammers, there is some truth to the fact that telomeres do appear to add DNA. However, the Nobel-Prize winning researcher Elizabeth Blackburn, who specializes in telomeres research, states that the best way to maintain them is through exercise, diet and stress control. Shelton, of course, wants to sell you a pill. So, he claims to have formulated a pill that preserves the health of your telomeres. He’ll sell you a 90-day supply of these unproven pills for…..wait for it…..$39 per bottle. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it.
But Dr. Blackburn warns that telomares can be good and bad; if the levels are too high, they can cause brain tumors and cancers. Shelton, of course, omits that important fact. That’s why Blackburn discourages people from taking supplements that boost telomerase. Too much telomerase can be worse than too little. The dangers of too much telomerase are laid out in this Scientific America article. There’s no scientific evidence that Shelton’s supplements actually work. BUT, if they did promote telomerase production, his supplements might be increasingly the cancer risk of anyone who uses his pills.
Questionable and Overpriced Ingredients
Shelton’s longevity pills allegedly contain the following ingredients: terminalia chebula fruit extract, purslane, turmeric root, resveritrol and ginseng. 90 of these questionable capsules will cost you over $120. So what do these ingredients really cost? We went to Vitacost and checked out their cost for these same ingredients. Here’s what we found:
- 200 Turmeric capsules (over twice as many as what Shelton is selling) will cost you about $20.
- 60 reseveratrol capsules cost about $5.
- 240 capsules of a ginseng blend cost about $17 (that’s more than twice the number that Shelton is selling)
- 120 capsules of terminalia chebula (along with tumeric and other extracts) costs less than $6.
- 120 capsules of purslane sells for about $12. (note: Vitacost doesn’t sell purslane because of its questionable health effects)
If you add up all of these supplements purchased separately, you come up with a total of $60, which is less than half of what Shelton is charging…..and you get a whole lot more for that money.
Our Recommendation
Ryan Shelton is a notorious infoscammer who sells dubious “cures” at premium prices. We recommend you avoid purchasing any of his products, but Longevity Activator is among the worst. It has little, if any, scientific support, it relies upon conspiratorial allegations and most all of the ingredients in these pills can be purchased for far less money.
Thanks for the clarifying information it was eye opening and helped see through paragraphs of professional bullshit.
Excellent product. I put a family member on Longevity Activator and a long-term skin problem healed up that no other doctor/dermatologist could do for five years for topical and oral toxic medicines.
Thanks for the excellent review. It definitely helped cut through the bullshit. Well done.