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> Obesity Pill Passes First Human Trial Comes out alright. (Go ahead, shoot me - but first flag this also.)

by ableal 17y ago

carbocation 17y ago
I'm not going to flag this story, because I find this pill to be a clever hack. It's basically an end-run around gastric bypass, if they can get its properties right. It takes up stomach volume, which is a really useful way to promote satiety thanks to the presence of stretch receptors there. If it works, it could seriously reduce the number of dangerous procedures for obesity treatment and replace them with a simple volume-filling pill. The battle of willpower not to eat instead becomes the battle of willpower to remember to "volume up" before eating so you feel full faster. This would be amazing for patients. I'm not convinced this will work as planned, but am excited that people are coming up with clever, relatively low-risk approaches like this. Eventually one might just work.
swombat 17y ago
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...
- ableal 17y ago
  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.

> Obesity Pill Passes First Human Trial Comes out alright. (Go ahead, shoot me - but first flag this also.)

by ableal 17y ago

> Obesity Pill Passes First Human Trial Comes out alright. (Go ahead, shoot me - but first flag this also.)

I'm not going to flag this story, because I find this pill to be a clever hack. It's basically an end-run around gastric bypass, if they can get its properties right. It takes up stomach volume, which is a really useful way to promote satiety thanks to the presence of stretch receptors there. If it works, it could seriously reduce the number of dangerous procedures for obesity treatment and replace them with a simple volume-filling pill. The battle of willpower not to eat instead becomes the battle of willpower to remember to "volume up" before eating so you feel full faster. This would be amazing for patients. I'm not convinced this will work as planned, but am excited that people are coming up with clever, relatively low-risk approaches like this. Eventually one might just work.

swombat 17y ago

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...

ableal 17y ago
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.