A successful diet drug is believed to be worth billions of pounds in profit for the manufacturing company. As a result, the pharmaceutical industry has attempted on many occasions to market successful diet drugs, but each attempt has ended in failure. Those drugs that have not given the patients heart valve problems (fenfluramine), psychosis (rimonobant) or leaky bowels (Olestra) have generally not caused weight loss and so have been useless. In fact, the pharmaceutical industry and the mainstream medical establishment has little to offer obese patients who wish to lose weight. However, a successful diet drug has been known to Chinese medicine for thousands of years, and its efficacy has been proved anecdotally throughout modern history. This anecdotal evidence is supported by scientific research that shows that the herb ma huang, and its synthetic chemical derivation ephedrine, cause weight loss that is superior to other known diet drugs.
Chemically ephedrine is a β-adrenergic agonist. This means it stimulates the adrenaline receptors on cells and causes cellular effects similar to adrenaline. The most useful physiological change this provides for weight loss is the stimulation of lypolysis, or the breakdown of triglycerides to fatty acids, and their subsequent oxidation for energy. This may be the primary mechanisms by which ephedrine causes weight loss, but other useful mechanisms of action are known. For example, ephedrine causes a substantial down regulation of appetite and therefore further benefits short-tern weight loss. Ephedrine also appears to prevent muscle loss during weight loss periods, which prevents the reductions is resting metabolic rate which often causes weight loss to cease. In fact, the physiological effects of ephedrine make it the best weight loss drug known to man. This is probably the very reason it has been banned, despite an exceptional safety record.
RdB
