By Tom Mangold,
BBC Two's Correspondent
Imagine this: an organic pill that kills the
appetite and attacks obesity. It has no known side-effects, and contains a
molecule that fools your brain into believing you are full. Deep inside the
African Kalahari desert, grows an ugly cactus-like plant called the Hoodia. It
thrives in extremely high temperatures, and takes years to mature. The San
Bushmen of the Kalahari, one of the world's oldest and most primitive tribes,
had been eating the Hoodia for thousands of years, to stave off hunger during
long hunting trips. When South African scientists were routinely testing it,
they discovered the plant contained a previously unknown molecule, which has
since been christened P 57. The license was sold to a Cambridgeshire
bio-pharmaceutical company, Phytopharm, who in turn sold the development and
marketing rights to the giant Pfizer Corporation.
Fortune Cactus
When I travelled to the Kalahari, I met families
of the San bushmen. It is a sad, impoverished and displaced tribe, still unaware
they are sitting on top of a goldmine. But if the Hoodia works, the 100,000 San
strung along the edge of the Kalahari will become overnight millionaires on
royalties negotiated by their South African lawyer Roger Chennells. And they
will need all the help they can to secure the money. Currently, many bushmen
smoke large quantities of marijuana, suffer from alcoholism, and have neither
possessions nor any sense of the value of money. The truth is no-one has fully
grasped what the magic molecule means for their counterparts in the developed
world.
Blood sugar
According to the British Heart Foundation 17% of
men and 21% of women are obese, while 46% of men and 32% of women are
overweight. So the drug's marketing potential speaks for itself. Phytopharm's Dr
Richard Dixey explained how P.57 actually works: "There is a part of your
brain, the hypothalamus. Within that mid-brain there are nerve cells that sense
glucose sugar. "When you eat, blood sugar goes up because of the food, these
cells start firing and now you are full. "What the Hoodia seems to contain is a
molecule that is about 10,000 times as active as glucose. "It goes to the
mid-brain and actually makes those nerve cells fire as if you were full. But you
have not eaten. Nor do you want to."
Clinical trials
Dixey organised the first animal trials for
Hoodia. Rats, a species that will eat literally anything, stopped eating
completely. When the first human clinical trial was conducted, a morbidly obese
group of people were placed in a "phase 1 unit", a place as close to prison as
it gets. All the volunteers could do all day was read papers, watch television,
and eat. Half were given Hoodia, half placebo. Fifteen days later, the Hoodia
group had reduced their calorie intake by 1000 a day. It was a stunning success.
The cactus test
In order to see for ourselves, we drove into the
desert, four hours north of Capetown in search of the cactus. Once there, we
found an unattractive plant which sprouts about 10 tentacles, and is the size of
a long cucumber. Each tentacle is covered in spikes which need to be carefully
peeled. Soon after, we began the four hour drive back to Capetown. The plant is
said to have a feel-good almost aphrodisiac quality, and I have to say, we felt
good. But more significantly, we did not even think about food. Our brains
really were telling us we were full. It was a magnificent deception. Dinner time
came and went. We reached our hotel at about midnight and went to bed without
food. And the next day, neither of us wanted nor ate breakfast. I ate lunch but
without appetite and very little pleasure. Partial then full appetite returned
slowly after 24 hours.
The future
Mr Chennells is ecstatic: "The San will finally throw off thousands of years of
oppression, poverty, social isolation and discrimination. "We will create trust
funds with their Hoodia royalties and the children will join South Africa's
middle classes in our lifetime. "I envisage Hoodia cafes in London and New York,
salads will be served and the Hoodia cut like cucumber on to the salad. "It will
need flavouring to counter its unpleasant taste, but if it has no side effects
and no cumulative side-effects." Unfortunately for the overweight, Hoodia will
not be around for several years, the clinical trials still have several years to
run. Do not travel to the Kalahari to steal the plant as it is hard to find and
illegal to export. And beware internet sites offering Hoodia "pills" from the US
as we tested the leading brand and discovered it has no discernible Hoodia in
it. So just be patient. Help is at hand.
Buy Hoodia-1000 |
