
Obesity Pill Passes First Human Trial - cwan
http://www.xconomy.com/boston/2010/04/22/obesity-capsule-from-gelesis-made-to-swell-up-in-the-stomach-passes-first-human-trial/
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yanowitz
I wonder if this really works long term, how people's leptin resistance
confounds its efficacy, etc.

I still remained shocked at how effective carb restriction is, assuming you
swap in lots of protein and fat from non-processsed food sources. The hassle
is that it takes more time to construct meals, etc., but if you eat less than
40g of carbs a day, you can eat to satiety and lose weight with relative ease
(at least, I did, as did many other people I know, so sample size of n=~8,
obviously, not conclusive).

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msluyter
Add +1 to your sample size. I cut out all grains at the beginning of this year
and effortlessly lost about 30 lbs.

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abrown28
I weighed 320 pounds when I cut out carbs. I lost approximately 5 pounds a
week until I got down to 275 at which point I couldn't stand it any more and
pigged out on donuts.

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allenp
The pill works by expanding to make you feel full (100-to-1 ratio claimed).

Here is a link to a 4min animation and a 1 minute live video (pill in glass of
water):

<http://www.gelesis.com/content/technology/>

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JeremyStein
Thanks for the link to the video. I had imagined it acting like expanding
polyurethane foam. I see it looks more like mush, which doesn't seem as
dangerous.

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JeremyStein
What happens if you swallow a dozen of these?

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swombat
The same thing that happens when you eat an overly large volume of something
else, I would imagine: you throw up.

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hugh3
If the pill genuinely expands 100-fold in your stomach then I can see it being
worse than throwing up. Either it might suck all the fluid out of your
stomach, in which case you won't be able to throw up, or it might fill your
stomach so rapidly that you can't bring them all up in time.

Of course I'm sure that the consequences of overdose are something the
researchers have thought about carefully and probably tested on animals by
now.

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rsheridan6
You should be able to throw up even if it sucks the fluid out of your stomach.
The muscles would still work, and the stuff should be slimy enough that it's
not going to scratch up your esophagus.

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stavrianos
Artificial roughage. Nice.

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ableal
> Obesity Pill Passes First Human Trial

Comes out alright.

(Go ahead, shoot me - but first flag this also.)

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swombat
Why do you feel this story should be flagged? It's technology-related,
involves a (biotech) start-up, and could impact a significant percentage of HN
readers' personal lives. Seems like the ideal HN story...

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ableal
Looks like one of those general interest stories you can find in any
newspaper, put out by PR to prop up the company. No technical details, secret
sauce, seems similar to just filling up with gelatin, except in expensive
pills. Not really 'hard biotech', not worth the attention, in short.

P.S. Yesterday, for instance, I voted up that 'paid comments' site link, not
because I think it's a good idea, but because it might generate some
interesting comments. I don't think it's the case with this, or economics/etc
discussions which quickly degenerate into pointless squabbling. Been around
that block with Usenet, and the experience hasn't improved - nowadays there's
not even killfiles, and the reading is slower. Not looking good.

