Fat Chance
“I’LL have the fat pig burger with a side order of obesity onion rings and blue cheese dressing smoothie. And to eat I’ll have the same with extra cheese and mayo. And some crisps while I’m waiting.”
Don’t worry about our friend in the restaurant. Such is the pace of technological advancement that so long as he remembers to take his medication he may well outlive us all. And the medicine of choice is Rimonabant.
The Times says that this is the wonder drug that will make the fat thin and keep the thin from getting fat.
“It reduces bodyweight by up to 10 per cent,” says the Times. And that’s not all. It can also fight other health problems, “such a diabetes and even smoking.”
(Amazing how smoking is now seen as disease in its own right. Smokers are now all sufferers, even the ones who don’t develop cancer.)
The paper produces a graphic to show how the drug works. There’s an arrow that points to the “hypothalamus”. It’s in your brain. The drug targets the receptors in the endocannabinoid system, which controls…”
Sure. Who cares how it works, just hurry up and give us some already. And, happily, the authorities have raced to get the drug to the people.
Britain is the first country in the world to receive Rimonabant. The powers that be only granted a licence for it to be administered to patients last week.
But it might be hard to come by. The paper says that though legal Rimonabant is unlikely to be made widely available on the NHS until the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has approved it.
As the paper also says, the drug retails at £55.20 per patient per month (£1.987 per tablet), and if everyone overweight took it, it would cost the NHS billions.
Of course, anyone willing to pay for treatment privately may well get it sooner. And it can’t be too long before we are all receiving letters and emails from companies offering us the stuff cheap and direct to our door.
Meaning we need not waste any precious biscuit-eating time seeing a doctor…
Posted: 29th, June 2006 | In: Uncategorized Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
