Don't let them hoodia wink you!

Fatties all across North America are getting excited about a cactus that the San Bushmen have been eating as part of their diet since time immemorial. The San discovered thousands of years ago that if you cut off a stem of the Hoodia Gordonii plant and nibbled on it you could stave off hunger during long hunting trips. The slow growing plants only flourish in the high temperatures of the barren Kalahari desert.
Scientists became aware of the plant about 40 years ago and in 1996 managed to isolate the chemical entity that suppresses appetite, named P57, and patented it. A license agreement was signed with a British company called Phytopharm who in turn signed an agreement with US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, the manufacturers of that other great discovery, Viagra, or so I'm led to believe, having no personal knowledge of the product. In mid 2003 Pfizer returned the rights to Phytopharm and discontinued clinical tests - a very strange move considering the obesity problem facing their primary market.
The bottom line is that the patent rests with South Africa's CSIR and Phytopharm has the licensing rights to develop the product. The San people will benefit from royalties once the drug is commercially available but that is unlikely to be before 2008. There are no legitimate hoodia products on the market yet and therefore anything you see available commercially is either fake in that it contains no hoodia or are unauthorised and infringe the patent. Fatties of the world you have been warned!