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Opening Arguments

Thinner

Indiana University is, unfortunately, contributing to the delusion held by millions that quick weight loss is just a magic pill away:

. . . a team of researchers at Indiana University released a study in the online journal Nature Chemical Biology that showed that two natural hormones combined into a single drug suppressed appetite and increased metabolism -- in rodents, anyway.

"There's a global epidemic of obesity," said Richard DiMarchi, chairman of the chemistry department at Indiana University in Bloomington and the study's lead researcher. "Our focus is finding therapies to lower body weight and treat diabetes."

A single injection of the drug decreased the rodents' body weight by 25 percent -- and fat mass by 42 percent -- after one week.

What might the side effects be -- assuming this drug works on humans, too -- of suppressing the appetite so dramatically that so much weight is lost is such a short time? Well, who cares? It would be so much easier than the hard work of treadmills and all those bland salads.

Posted in: Hoosier lore, Science
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