Training Blog

We’ve all heard about the growing rates of obesity in Britain and the USA. With the increasing number of bizarre diets and diet pills it was only a matter of time before somebody invented a pill that could apparently cure obesity. The company that invented the drug called Lorcaserin saw a 20% decline in shares after it announced that the 2 year trial period on 3,000 patients at over 100 sites throughout the US had fallen short of the benchmark sought by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The results of the trial were:

• 47.5% of Lorcaserin patients lost 5% or more of their body weight, compared to 20.3% in the placebo group in 12 month.
• In the first 12 months the Lorcaserin group lost on average 5.8% of body weight (12.7 pounds), compared to 2.2% (4.7 pounds) in the placebo group.
• In total 22.6% of Lorcaserin patients lost 10% or more of their body weight compared to 7.7 % in the placebo group.

It seems that there are also reports the results are more than good enough to meet the FDA requirement for approval, the Arena claims that the drug has met all its primary endpoints, and shows significantly greater weight loss compared to placebo.

It is already accepted that obesity is a widespread disease, so having an effective therapy that can be used by the majority of patients who need to reduce their weight that could also be beneficial for conditions, such as diabetes, lipid disorders, and cardiovascular disease, Lorcaserin is the first in a new class of selective serotonin 2C receptor agonists; the serotonin 2C receptor is in the hypothalamus and other parts of the brain and helps to control of appetite and metabolism. This could potentially save the NHS millions of pounds as instead of paying for patients to have procedures such as stomach stapling and liposuction, a simple course of tablets can be just as effective.