Diet pill, eat what you want

Read an update on this yesterday,
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/diet-pill-weight-gain-fat-mice
(The article I read was in Danish, and I cannot seem to find it in English)
and it seems as though scientists are moving closer to an actual pill for humans.

I'm just a bit concerned about the effect. While I'm sure it will would be nice to be able to eat all I want every day, without gaining weight, what will that do to my eating habits? Will I end up eating 3000+ kcal every day?
Will it mean I'll eventually NEED the pill to avoid gaining weight?

Replies

ladyreva78

Study if anyone is interested: http://science.sciencemag.org/content/361/6402/599

My question: what happens with fat-soluble vitamin absorption? They use the same mechanisms as dietary fats (i.e. the mechanism they blocked in these rats).

makkimakki2018

Theres this pill going around and really popular with the women of asia. It's called Nakattakotoni it translates to (it didn't happen) from what i understand is that it eliminates/reduces the absorption of carbohydrates and makes it easier to maintain weight or lose it. I see my mother taking these pills right after eating carbs and her weight apparently stays the same. She said if she didn't take the pill then her weight would have spiked. Don't know anything more than that, but apparently it works.

Dilvish

A pill to prevent weight gain? Screwing around with the natural balance in your body is not a good thing. Even if they were successful in creating such a pill, it would likely wreak havoc on the body over time.

The irony is that if someone was ever successful in creating such a pill, the company that funded it would become the richest company in the world.

It's sad to know that instead of spending research funds on cures for diabetes, cancer and Alzheimer's, they opt for a weight loss pill....

ktekc

like the carb version of Alli? yikes

RealWorldStrengthLLC

Screw that, I'd rather have research going towards myostasin inhibitors. (Half-kidding)

Aaron_K123

So assuming it works it is a pill that encourages people to waste food. Yeah....awesome. How about instead of becoming pathological about food consumption as a society we work instead towards viewing food as fuel and a limited resource because that is what it is.

I mean seriously..yeah, let's all overproduced food in developed wealthy nations and lower agricultural resources by depleting soils just so we can pop a pill and crap it all out without actually getting any value from having consumed it. Meanwhile in undeveloped nations people continue to suffer from malnutrition. That sounds like some sort of description of one if the levels of hell from Dante's inferno not something to strive to accomplish.

pinuplove

Aaron_K123 wrote: »

So assuming it works it is a pill that encourages people to waste food. Yeah....awesome. His about instead of becoming pathological about food consumption as a society we work instead towards viewing food as fuel and a limited resource because that is what it is.

I mean seriously..yeah, let's all overproduced food in developed wealthy nations and lower agricultural resources by depleting soils just so we can pop a pill and crap it all out without actually getting any value from having consumed it. Meanwhile in undeveloped nations people continue to suffer from malnutrition. That sounds like some sort of description of one if the levels of hell from Dante's inferno not something to strive to accomplish.

Reminds one of the hedonism of cultures past, no? Ended well for them.

kbmnurse1

I mean really?

lemurcat2

pinuplove wrote: »

Aaron_K123 wrote: »

So assuming it works it is a pill that encourages people to waste food. Yeah....awesome. His about instead of becoming pathological about food consumption as a society we work instead towards viewing food as fuel and a limited resource because that is what it is.

I mean seriously..yeah, let's all overproduced food in developed wealthy nations and lower agricultural resources by depleting soils just so we can pop a pill and crap it all out without actually getting any value from having consumed it. Meanwhile in undeveloped nations people continue to suffer from malnutrition. That sounds like some sort of description of one if the levels of hell from Dante's inferno not something to strive to accomplish.

Reminds one of the hedonism of cultures past, no? Ended well for them.

Has anyone seen The Favourite? There is a particular scene that comes to mind.

mangrothian

lemurcat2 wrote: »

pinuplove wrote: »

Aaron_K123 wrote: »

So assuming it works it is a pill that encourages people to waste food. Yeah....awesome. His about instead of becoming pathological about food consumption as a society we work instead towards viewing food as fuel and a limited resource because that is what it is.

I mean seriously..yeah, let's all overproduced food in developed wealthy nations and lower agricultural resources by depleting soils just so we can pop a pill and crap it all out without actually getting any value from having consumed it. Meanwhile in undeveloped nations people continue to suffer from malnutrition. That sounds like some sort of description of one if the levels of hell from Dante's inferno not something to strive to accomplish.

Reminds one of the hedonism of cultures past, no? Ended well for them.

Has anyone seen The Favourite? There is a particular scene that comes to mind.

I was thinking of the vomitorium in the Hunger Games. I'm guessing it's the same sort of thing.

MsBaz2018

makkimakki2018 wrote: »

Theres this pill going around and really popular with the women of asia. It's called Nakattakotoni it translates to (it didn't happen) from what i understand is that it eliminates/reduces the absorption of carbohydrates and makes it easier to maintain weight or lose it. I see my mother taking these pills right after eating carbs and her weight apparently stays the same. She said if she didn't take the pill then her weight would have spiked. Don't know anything more than that, but apparently it works.

So... Was she gaining weight before she started taking this pill? Or is she eating more carbs now that she has started taking them?

lakinapook

don't they already have a fat blocking pill called Alli?

happytree923

This has already been around for over a decade, it's called Alli. It blocks a certain percentage of fat but the side effects are oily poop and poopy oil leaking out your *kitten* after fatty meals. Needing a diaper to deal with the leakage is a not-uncommon experience from what I've read about Alli. If you're 'blocking' absorption, the fat has to go somewhere so I don't see how a different medication would work around this. I wonder if a carb blocker would be slightly less unpleasant because I would guess your anal sphincter might be a little better at holding back partially digested carbs compared to oil but in any case, why????

ETA from what I've read Alli really doesn't help people lose weight either. It doesn't block all fat and the weight loss difference was pretty negligible in the company's own studies if I remember correctly.

AutumLeaf

Diet pills are a con and can be very dangerous too! They just make you crap out horrible oily gunk. I personally think they should be banned! I've seen the dangers of what they can do firsthand and it's nasty!

NorthCascades

Aaron_K123 wrote: »

So assuming it works it is a pill that encourages people to waste food. Yeah....awesome. How about instead of becoming pathological about food consumption as a society we work instead towards viewing food as fuel and a limited resource because that is what it is.

I mean seriously..yeah, let's all overproduced food in developed wealthy nations and lower agricultural resources by depleting soils just so we can pop a pill and crap it all out without actually getting any value from having consumed it. Meanwhile in undeveloped nations people continue to suffer from malnutrition. That sounds like some sort of description of one if the levels of hell from Dante's inferno not something to strive to accomplish.

You know what would be awesome? An app to bring those diet pills from the front door to the couch, so nobody has to get up, ever. Kind of like Uber Eats, but for things Amazon has already delivered.

aokoye

NorthCascades wrote: »

Aaron_K123 wrote: »

So assuming it works it is a pill that encourages people to waste food. Yeah....awesome. How about instead of becoming pathological about food consumption as a society we work instead towards viewing food as fuel and a limited resource because that is what it is.

I mean seriously..yeah, let's all overproduced food in developed wealthy nations and lower agricultural resources by depleting soils just so we can pop a pill and crap it all out without actually getting any value from having consumed it. Meanwhile in undeveloped nations people continue to suffer from malnutrition. That sounds like some sort of description of one if the levels of hell from Dante's inferno not something to strive to accomplish.

You know what would be awesome? An app to bring those diet pills from the front door to the couch, so nobody has to get up, ever. Kind of like Uber Eats, but for things Amazon has already delivered.

All we need is for Alexa to manage to get your door to physically open and for a drone to fly in with your diet pills. I'm sure this could be done (with a boat load of security risks...).

Luciicul

I'm curious about why so many people react negatively to the idea of some kind of medication to help people who are overweight or obese to lose weight. Do you feel the same way about nicotine patches to help smokers quit smoking, or about alcohol (our body has no need of it; surely this is a waste of resources too?), or question people who drive their car to work then have to hit the gym to get exercise that they wouldn't need if they had ridden their bike?

Fact is our society has a huge fat problem (one-third of adults are overweight), and 95% of people who lose weight regain it. Something is really screwed up to create this endemic in the western world, and it is clearly not an easy problem to solve or else it would have been solved by now. (Do you really think people today are greedier and lazier than previous generations, or rather that something has changed either in our food chain or modern living that makes it harder for us to maintain a healthy weight?)

If hypothetically there was a pill that would help people maintain a steady healthy weight, this would literally save lives as it would presumably also greatly reduce the amount of obesity-related illness - diabetes, heart disease, etc. It would greatly improve the quality of lives not just for the millions who are overweight and obese, but also for their families, with flow on benefits to employers and general society.

That's not to say that the pill in the linked article meets the criteria for the hypothetical wonder pill. The article clearly outlines that it has only been trialled in mice and has some side-effects that would not be acceptable in humans. But if there was a medicine that helped people maintain a healthy weight without bad side effects, it would be a godsend.

EvgenyP

If people want to take it, let them take it lol. I'm personally opting in for 100% effective weight loss technology = eating less calories than you need, to lose weight. I don't think diet pills should be banned as someone here mentioned. Being fat is probably alot worse and it comes with many comorbidities and loss of quality of life than some side effects from medication.

brisadeldesierto

Luciicul wrote: »

I'm curious about why so many people react negatively to the idea of some kind of medication to help people who are overweight or obese to lose weight. Do you feel the same way about nicotine patches to help smokers quit smoking, or about alcohol (our body has no need of it; surely this is a waste of resources too?), or question people who drive their car to work then have to hit the gym to get exercise that they wouldn't need if they had ridden their bike?

Fact is our society has a huge fat problem (one-third of adults are overweight), and 95% of people who lose weight regain it. Something is really screwed up to create this endemic in the western world, and it is clearly not an easy problem to solve or else it would have been solved by now. (Do you really think people today are greedier and lazier than previous generations, or rather that something has changed either in our food chain or modern living that makes it harder for us to maintain a healthy weight?)

If hypothetically there was a pill that would help people maintain a steady healthy weight, this would literally save lives as it would presumably also greatly reduce the amount of obesity-related illness - diabetes, heart disease, etc. It would greatly improve the quality of lives not just for the millions who are overweight and obese, but also for their families, with flow on benefits to employers and general society.

That's not to say that the pill in the linked article meets the criteria for the hypothetical wonder pill. The article clearly outlines that it has only been trialled in mice and has some side-effects that would not be acceptable in humans. But if there was a medicine that helped people maintain a healthy weight without bad side effects, it would be a godsend.

I don't think people react wrong (at least not me) to the idea of a drug that helps people lose weight. The issue is the approach, which as they pointed out already, is an enormous waste of resources, and doesn't really seem to fix the issue either (I'm failing to see how a person that supposedly can eat all they want, then take a pill to only absorb some of those calories, will eventually learn self control and not become dependent on the pill for the rest of their life).

It's not the same thing as a nicotine patch, since those help *quit* smoking. The equivalent to the pill here would be a "patch" that allows a smoker to smoke all they want without the known side effects. There's no drug either that allows an alcoholic to keep drinking whatever they want without consequences. I also fail to see how the lack of alcohol or cigarettes will be detrimental for any society, as it obviously is in the case of food.

Producing food uses not only the soil were it was produced, but there's also large amounts of energy used in the farming, transporting, processing, storing, marketing.. And it requires lots of water, arguably the most important resource for human life. So it consumes soils, water, energy, and human resources. And in turn it produces wastes on packaging, on carbon foot print, contaminated water.. All this to feed someone that doesn't need it.

I think there's a fundamental moral issue with this drug, one that feeds individualism and consumerism. Wouldn't it be morally better to research a drug that focus on making a person less hungry without side effects? Or wouldn't it be better to put some effort into teaching people how to properly eat, or researching how we could better teach them, better reach them?

neugebauer52

I am asking myself (and others who carry too much weight with them) WHY some of us are overeating on a continuous basis. So many times I hear the same story: some psychological drama in one's life, often PTSD, situations people can't cope with adequately. It is always so easy to stuff my face - feels like instant love, instant gratification, instant satisfaction to sooth the hurting soul. Addressing the inner pain should come first and I do not mean in the form of medication only. I have been there - my second step now is to lose a total of about 80 kg (175 pounds).

Luciicul

@brisadeldesierto If your argument is about use of resources, then surely should also be arguing for people to have sedentary lives so we don't need so much energy or food - don't go to the gym, don't work out - because these activities chew up resources.

Far biggest waste of resources is industry producing extra food for subsidies that are not needed, combined with destroying any food that are not deemed to look good enough (e.g. bananas that aren't the preferred size or shape). Doesn't matter how much we individuals minimise our own waste and carbon footprints when industry contributes many times waste more without care. (Sure; we do what we can in our own lives, but it is false to heap responsibility on the shoulders of ordinary individuals when corporations, industries, and governments have a far bigger impact than we ever could.)

It's a strawman argument to claim we shouldn't help obese people with (hypothetical) medication because they should simply stop using extra resources.

It is a flawed belief to assume that obesity is all about overeating and waste of resources. Medication can lead to weight gain, health conditions can lead to weight gain, some studies have shown that weight loss can lead to lowered resting metabolic rate even when people eat well and exercise (e.g. https://www.sbs.com.au/food/article/2016/11/27/why-so-many-people-regain-weight-after-dieting) which means they put on weight while eating less food than others, stress, hormones, sleep, etc can all affect weight without drawing on any extra resources.

'Morality' - to leave a person untreated because you want to teach them a lesson? Righto.

To be honest I think the mass "education" is part of the reason we have these problems. I was taught in school that breads and cereals are what you can eat heaps of - 6-8 serves a day - yet what I have realised as an adult is that this actually makes me gain weight. When you look at the impact of industry lobbyists on public health policy and 'education', you have to realise it is not an unbiased source of information. Half the health fads have been created by the health sector pushing one idea or another before there is conclusive evidence (e.g. remember for a time that eggs were bad because they are high in cholesterol? But then a couple decades later they realised that cholesterol in your diet is not the same as blood cholesterol, and that removing cholesterol from the diet can actually increase blood cholesterol? Or when they told pregnant women to avoid allergens like peanuts so their foetus wouldn't develop allergies... then after there was a spike in babies born with allergies they realised that it's better for pregnant women to eat a wide variety of foods including peanuts to minimise allergies... total reversals in health advice).

Honestly, I don't think there is any health or diet advice that is applicable to everyone. We each have to discover what works for us, and half of what mucks us around is listening to generic advice that might work for 60% of the population but not necessarily for us specifically. (If something works for 90% of the population, but you are one of the 10% it doesn't work for...).

The problem is not just at an individual level, the stats show it is something happening in our society - driven by many complex factors. Our society is more 'educated' than at any point in history, yet we struggle with some of the basics of life. We have more obesity, more depression, more suicidality, more auto-immune diseases, more allergies, more man-made illnesses, etc. I'm not saying a weight loss pill is the solution, but the "eat less, move more" message that has been repeated adnauseum for decades clearly isn't working for 1/3rd of the population either.

In the country I live in, medications are regulated. They aren't handed out willy-nilly. Any such medication would only be provided to those who need it, under medical supervision, and would no doubt also be provided alongside health information about eating and exercise as doctors already do. Just because a medical treatment exists (e.g liposuction) doesn't mean everyone uses it, or that people will intentionally overindulge to capitalise on it.

The benefit of science is to research lots of things, better understand how things work, and hopefully find solutions. Research is being done in many fields; researching solutions regarding weightloss (which affects about 1/3rd of the western adult population) doesn't mean they aren't also researching other important things too.

brisadeldesierto

@Lucciicul I never said that "we shouldn't help obese people with (hypothetical) medication because they should simply stop using extra resources". That's completely taking my point out of context. What I said was there are better approaches as to how to help them, both that are better for the environment and probably for themselves (I insist that it seems to me that a person taking this drug will become dependent on it, since the core issue is still not treated).

And yes, industries and so on have more impact that one individual can do. But with that reasoning, and talking about carbon foot print here, most countries have no impact on climate change either. Four countries produce more than 50% of the emissions of all the world. China, United States, India and Russia. And if we count Japan and the EU in, thats 70%. So emissions could be controlled by reducing what these countries produce, and what the rest of the ~160 countries do don't matter. So I guess they should be doing whatever they want, because in the end it's all about what the developed countries do. Right?

This sort of mentality is (in part) of what I was referring to when I said there's a moral issue with this drug. Not by any means that a person should be left "untreated because I want to teach them a lesson". But, again, there are today other ways to treat/help a person overweight. Yes, there are medical conditions that make a person gain more weight than the average, but I haven't seen a single study showing the case of a person with any of these conditions that couldn't lose weight without the professional help that is already out there. Same with the adaptive thermogenesis issue. Even if there is one for all or some people, there are here and other forums countless of evidence of people losing their weight and maintaining for many the years. Did they have to consume less than the TDEE calculators say? Maybe. But they are still doing it without any pills.

I would keep answering but I'm already late for work.

magnusthenerd

Aaron_K123 wrote: »

So assuming it works it is a pill that encourages people to waste food. Yeah....awesome. How about instead of becoming pathological about food consumption as a society we work instead towards viewing food as fuel and a limited resource because that is what it is.

I mean seriously..yeah, let's all overproduced food in developed wealthy nations and lower agricultural resources by depleting soils just so we can pop a pill and crap it all out without actually getting any value from having consumed it. Meanwhile in undeveloped nations people continue to suffer from malnutrition. That sounds like some sort of description of one if the levels of hell from Dante's inferno not something to strive to accomplish.

I'm not sure it is so black and white. People that are obese are already "wasting" food in a sense. They also have a higher risk of negative health issues, so economically speaking, even if they ate the same but stopped being obese, these people would reduce their strain on global resources. Granted, this assumes there is some level at which not doing a heart a bypass in America can be economically exchanged for growing 5 more ears of corn in a starving country. Though the food wastage argument already does assume not growing 5 ears of food in America or other developed country can be exchanged for 5 ears grown elsewhere, so I think it is fairer than it seems.
It does seem that ideally a diet pill would kill appetite, not just at a base physiological level but at a hedonic level, rather than just causing calories to bypass digestion. Still, I'd rather not have the perfect be the enemy of the good.

magnusthenerd

Luciicul wrote: »

It is a flawed belief to assume that obesity is all about overeating and waste of resources. Medication can lead to weight gain, health conditions can lead to weight gain, some studies have shown that weight loss can lead to lowered resting metabolic rate even when people eat well and exercise (e.g. https://www.sbs.com.au/food/article/2016/11/27/why-so-many-people-regain-weight-after-dieting) which means they put on weight while eating less food than others, stress, hormones, sleep, etc can all affect weight without drawing on any extra resources.

There's a lot about the morality I agree with, but this article about the Biggest Loser study and the idea that overeating isn't what weight gain is about, I have to disagree with. There are questions of that particular study with the study like what kind of RMR prediction equations they used, if some contestants were actually trying to lose weight near the follow up, and the portrayal of the RMR change (a lot of write ups pretend one's metabolism should not change when losing weight, it absolutely should as there is less body to maintain).
Some medications cause weight gain via water retention, weight gain from a medication lowering metabolism is rare, and there are a number of medications that alter appetite. Beyond the water retention ones, the other medications still involve overeating - taking in more calories than maintain the current body fat levels - though of course one should be sympathetic that the person has a harder time.

Luciicul wrote: »

To be honest I think the mass "education" is part of the reason we have these problems. I was taught in school that breads and cereals are what you can eat heaps of - 6-8 serves a day - yet what I have realised as an adult is that this actually makes me gain weight. When you look at the impact of industry lobbyists on public health policy and 'education', you have to realise it is not an unbiased source of information. Half the health fads have been created by the health sector pushing one idea or another before there is conclusive evidence (e.g. remember for a time that eggs were bad because they are high in cholesterol? But then a couple decades later they realised that cholesterol in your diet is not the same as blood cholesterol, and that removing cholesterol from the diet can actually increase blood cholesterol? Or when they told pregnant women to avoid allergens like peanuts so their foetus wouldn't develop allergies... then after there was a spike in babies born with allergies they realised that it's better for pregnant women to eat a wide variety of foods including peanuts to minimise allergies... total reversals in health advice).

Honestly, I don't think there is any health or diet advice that is applicable to everyone. We each have to discover what works for us, and half of what mucks us around is listening to generic advice that might work for 60% of the population but not necessarily for us specifically. (If something works for 90% of the population, but you are one of the 10% it doesn't work for...).

The problem is not just at an individual level, the stats show it is something happening in our society - driven by many complex factors. Our society is more 'educated' than at any point in history, yet we struggle with some of the basics of life. We have more obesity, more depression, more suicidality, more auto-immune diseases, more allergies, more man-made illnesses, etc. I'm not saying a weight loss pill is the solution, but the "eat less, move more" message that has been repeated adnauseum for decades clearly isn't working for 1/3rd of the population either.

I think we have more than enough knowledge about the physiology for weight control - not necessarily physical health nutrition. What we lack is the psychology that makes someone follow what is needed for calories in, calories out / eat less and move more. We definitely do have a secular trend in obesity in modern societies. At least part of it can be accounted for by the fact that we do, on average, move less.
I'm not so sure about the rates of other traits though. It is a bit hard to say what the baseline for human auto-immune disease is, say, when someone has an auto-immune disease that is potentially fatal in society without modern medicine.

80sSynthwave

On a proper diet, your body maintains homeostasis. Pills are nonsense.

J72FIT

Imagine this actually worked. IMO, the psychology behind disordered eating would just show up somewhere else as a different disorder...