Hoodia Appetite Suppressant: Hoopla or Hope?

From the Kalahari Desert region of South Africa grows a succulent called Hoodia (pronounced HOO-dee-ah) gordonii that seems to have amazing appetite and thirst suppression properties.

The stout plant which resembles a flowering cactus, is a slow-growing succulent that can reach to a height of several feet. The San bushmen of the region have known about Hoodia for thousands of years and the appetite and thirst suppressant properties of this bitter plant, which is broken off and chewed.

So great the potential for lucrative profits as a dietary/weight loss supplement is this cactus-like product that in 1977 the South Africa Council for Scientific and Industrial Research identified and patented the active ingredient, a molecule known as "P57." If this patent stood unchallenged, it would create a lucrative monopoly for any product containing Hoodia used for the purpose of appetite suppression/weight loss.

The patent was challenged by the San tribe of the Kalahari, as the CSIR didn't 'discover' the effects of Hoodia, the San tribe had already been using the succulent for this purpose for centuries. So in 2002, the CSIR was forced to recognize the patent challenge and to this day, sets aside a decreed percentage of the profits of Hoodia sales and spin-offs of this product for the betterment of the San tribes.

  (image source)

Hoodia gordonii is native to the semi-arid regions of the Kalahari desert of South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, and Angola and is a protected plant. Hoodia can only be commercially gathered in the wild by individuals and corporations licensed to do so.

The succulent is also being grown privately as both an ornamental plant and alternative medicine, so it may someday be something that the average gardener can have in their semi-arid rock garden much the oft-touted aloe plants.

 Hoodia is a slow-growing plant, requiring up to five years or more before the plant is suitable to harvest.

There are over a dozen varieties of the Hoodia succulent, but it is believed that only the Hoodia gordonii contains the active ingredient steroidal glycoside, known as "P57," which is believed to give the plant its potent dietary hunger-suppressant effects.

Is Hoodia gordinii Effective at Curbing Appetite?

Does research actually prove that Kalahari Hoodia Gordonii actually stave-off hunger pains and thirst, create a feeling of satiety and cause the user to eat less and thus, cause the body to lose weight? The answer seems to be a cautious but optimistic yes!

Research on the product while inconclusive, does seem to hold that the molecule known as "P57" works as claimed by mimicking the same effect that glucose (a sugar) has, causing receptive nerve cells in the brain to react, causing a 'full' sensation. The feeling of satiety ('fullness') potentially causes the diner to eat less, eat less often and it seems to do so without any jittery stimulant effect like caffeine or the banned substance dietary substance Ephedra whose undesirable side effects are now quite widely known.

Users claim that Hoodia capsules take effect within 20-30 minutes of swallowing the product (usually in capsule form but other forms are available) and the effects can last for hours, even all day long.

Other users claim that it takes a few days of regular use for them to notice beneficial effect, but they do cite reduced appetite and all without any untoward side effects. -No jittery nerves, no upset stomach or reflux, no heart palpitations, etc. Users note that there are not even any strange aftertaste from taking the product.
 Dietary weight-loss claims of consuming up to 1000-calories less per day and losing up to 5-lbs. per week when used as directed are not uncommon.

Some researchers believe that while "P57" appears to be effective, the exact chemical compound of P57 might lead to discovery of related drug compounds that are even more effective and could lead to peer-studies that conclusively prove the efficacy of the product.



Because Hoodia gordonii is classified as a 'dietary supplement' and not a 'food,' the USDA does not provide any data to support claims made for the product. It is reported however that as much as 80% of Hoodia supplements available online are either fake, contaminated or diluted for the supposedly purpose of maximizing profits.

One should only buy Hoodia gordonii products from reputable sources that have independent lab studies for testing and reporting product purity.

Commercially available, Hoodia gordonii supplements can be purchased in several convenient forms ranging from easy to swallow capsules, powder which can be mixed with water or another beverage, convenient liquid drops, and even tea. There are even candies such as bite-sized chocolates that contain the active P57 ingredient found in Hoodia.

Your Diet and Weight-Loss Goals

Hoodia gordonii might be an effective supplement to your long-term weight-loss objective, -but it is no miracle 'melt the pounds' panacea. Curbing your appetite can make dieting easier, and this product seems to perform as advertised. Even a little bit of help to get your diet started can be of great importance.

For the longer term though, exercise, eating right and maintaining a healthy lifestyle along with Hoodia gordonii supplementation can most definitely provide positive results to your weight-loss goals.

Blogging and Writer's Block, -What to Write About?

Trying to write blog-worthy entries seems a daunting task for someone whom is by profession not a writer. I have topics to share however. I have many things that may be of interest to read should I get around to writing them. The topics I would write are everywhere. I just need to pick one or two and commit some time to tell the story even if I may not tell it well the first time around.

Antique & Victorian Era Medical Devices

In the early days of medical science, many implements were created for supposed medical purposes that today seem to have more in common with medieval torture tools.
 Various devices for the removal of tumors for instance were little more than delicate hand-held tripod calipers to be inserted into body cavities (anus, vagina, bullet hole/arrow wound, etc.) and plied open so a ligating loop or (gasp!) guillotine-like blades could access and slice the offending tumor off.

 Alternative devices could grab ahold of a war projectile and pull it out without causing more damage to tissue. No one knows how many people bled to death or died from infections from such brusque treatment. ‘Do no harm’ seems to have been vacant in the early years of medical practice.

I once saw a collection of antique dental tools whose function was to gouge-out dental caries (cavities) in patients (without the use of any anesthesia) and another miniature cup-like tool on a long slender handle that would hold a small quantity of molten metallic gold which was then poured directly into the prepared tooth recess to fill it!
No telling how many people died from this sitting!

 18k ‘yellow gold’ melts at 1676 degrees Fahrenheit and 14k gold melts at around 1550 degrees Fahrenheit. The sudden introduction of heat would shock the tooth instantly and would cause the moisture to boil, then to explode in most cases no doubt. The patient would certainly do some moving around!

Later, refinement to gold fillings was to use gold leaf pressed into cleaned cavity holes and built-up to form a more familiar gold filling.

Another medical kit I saw once was for, believe it or not, blowing cigar smoke up the rectum of drowning victims!
The idea was that the warm cigar smoke would return life to the recently drowned by warming the body internally.
I’m sure that the notion of mystical ethereal smoke imparting life was part of this false belief too. It of course was a dismal failure but the dubious claims of its merit led to the expression “blowing smoke up one’s ass” whenever anyone gave advice that seemed incredulous and hard to believe.

Conservation and Green Energy/Low Wattage Devices

Do you use those mini-fluorescent light bulbs in your home? We do too. They reduce energy consumption by 75%-80% over conventional incandescent bulbs. They also emit much less heat and these bulbs last up to five years. Sounds like a great idea despite the initial higher cost of the bulbs, right?


Image Source

But did you realize that it takes more energy to create these bulbs in the first place than traditional incandescent bulbs?
 Possibly, the amount of energy used to create these will never be realized in the energy savings at the consumer level. And there is the issue of safe disposal.

These bulbs contain a minute amount of mercury gas which must be reclaimed lest it escape and pollute the environment. -Another influx of energy must be used to extract this toxic gas from the bulbs and render it safe before disposal/recycle of materials can occur. ‘Green energy’ here is not so green after all.

 It appears that fluorescent bulbs actually use more energy in the long run, not less. I am getting really tired of the expression “carbon footprint” too.

More Bicycle Lanes: Fewer Vehicles on the Road?

Another minor peeve of mine is the trend here in the city towards the narrowing existing roads and streets to create ‘bicycle-only lanes’ on both sides of the street. Great! Now bikes can now share the roads more safely and this means fewer cars on the roads, right?

 But the existing roads that are narrowed to accommodate this future green trend equates to fewer lanes for the cars still using them. They must now drive a bit slower still.

Often a three lane highway converts to a two lane highway with a bus and bike-only lane. Narrower roads means cars must drive with respect to the bicyclist whom despite using the ‘motor vehicle lanes’ has the same right-of-way of a pedestrian (which trumps that of the motor vehicle in every instance.)

Bicyclists often take untoward risks (and probably ticketable offenses) just like a jaywalker might and expect the motor vehicles to allow them undeniable transit.

Fewer vehicle lanes in busy inner city transit corridors also means idling in place for longer periods during rush hours. Many cities are instituting a 'no standing/idling' laws, another ticketable offense.

Longer commute times to be expected...

 We can also expect longer response time for emergency vehicles trying to get through bumper-to-bumper congestion in these narrowed streets as well. Let’s not forget the ubiquitous stalled car or accident which now holds up traffic even longer because there is less room for traffic to get around the obstruction.

All this talk about higher-mileage cars and improved emissions seems to omit some sectors of pollution. There are plenty of gasoline-powered lawn mowers in the city that have no emissions controls whatsoever.
 -A few hundred thousand lawn mowers run once or twice every week here in a city (Toronto, CANADA) of over 3-million people.
 Golf courses, city managed parks and large lawns must be mowed at least weekly to look acceptable. That has got to be creating some substantial and unregulated pollution too.

Where are the pollution controls and lower emission standards for these? I do note that the use of electric lawnmowers and those mechanical ‘push mowers’ is on the increase. I applaud that.

Fuel Additives and Aftermarket Devices to Increase Mileage in Motor Vehicle

Something I’d like to learn more about is the merits of using fuel additives to improve mileage and reduce emissions. There is a recent movement of using a very small quantity (about one ounce per 20 gallons of gasoline) of high grade acetone in a filled tank of gasoline for a purported substantial increase in MPG (miles per gallon.)

While I do not personally advocate the reader to experiment with this, it could be worthwhile. From what I have read there seems to be a lot of fact to this. Certainly the proponents of using this additive say so.

The problem exists though that acetone is highly corrosive to some plastics. Some automobile gas tanks use a plastic liner inside of the regular metal tank as a measure against static electricity conduction and as a additional containment vessel in the event of a rear-end collision.
While gasoline and commonly accepted additives (ethanol, etc.) are also corrosive, this plastic liner might not survive exposure to even minute amounts of diluted acetone and could possibly melt or degrade over time.
This plastic sludge could clog the fuel filter, pump, foul the engine, plug the injector ports, and do any manner of harm to your car.
-What if the fuel injectors or the injector rail itself uses these plastic internal components? Gaskets, O-rights, plastic seals?

To increase your mileage by 10-15 MPG you might destroy an $800 vital part of your car and in the process void any vehicle warranty. No money saved there.

The Pogue 200 Miles per Gallon Carburetor Started it All

Back in the last 70s and throughout the 1980s I used to tinker with commercially available gas-savings devices, economy tuning and alternative methods of fuel delivery and carburetion.




Several passive devices that I built were based upon old U.S. Patents of devices that were created decades ago. Before the advent of fuel-injection, a carbureted engine could benefit greatly by running the incoming fuel line which is wrapped around a water hose on the vehicle.

A length of bendable copper tubing tightly coiled around a copper pipe which itself is spliced into the rubber hose of the heater-core return line raises the temperature of gasoline passed through it to the carburetor reliably.

 Raising the temperature of the fuel to 165-180F degrees (maintained by the thermostat of the car) improved the mileage substantially. I found that on long road trips this alone improved mileage by about 8 or 9 MPG!

A serious drawback to fuel pre-heating was that upon parking the car the warm gas in the coiled loop was still warm and often burped its way through the meter float-valve of the carburetor as hot gaseous fuel. Carburetor float needle valves were designed to only regulate liquid gasoline, not gaseous or semi-gaseous fuel bubbles.

Probably only a fractions of ounces actually escaped as fumes from this pre-heater system but it is still raw unburnt gasoline being released.

 It does not matter if it is released into the air or dumped directly upon the ground; it is still gasoline.
This was raw fuel that would not be used as intended, is polluting the environment and is potentially explosive if upon starting the car there were any free sparks to ignite any residual fumes not to mention its loss decreases your expected miles-per-tankful.

 I always felt that an electronic fuel cut-off switch mounted just before the carburetor to stop the fuel at shut-down would solve this. This electronic switch that ‘opens’ when the car motor is started and closes at engine shut-down would lock the hot fuel so that it cannot escape. It could contain the hot gaseous fuel until it cools and thus returns to the liquid state.

Toxic Waste Dumps

In the early 1980s I worked at a wood shop behind an industrial complex that back in the 50s apparently was an oil refinery. Back then, they had very few regulatory oversight for the proper way to dispose of chemicals so what had been done was a trench was dug and used it as an open ditch.

It was a chemical cesspool. A place to dump the bad things they had no use for. Eventually, this was covered up with dirt and forgotten.

Well it turns out this waste dump was just a few hundred feet upstream from the water intake valves for that town, and there were ‘measurable levels’ of toxins being found in the water in the later 70s.
 Under then-President Ronald Regan’s administration, there was a Superfund Cleanup bill that allocated money for the cleanup of toxic sites in America. This location received monies for the cleanup and containment of the pollution.

 They found Dioxin, Endrin (an insecticide) and poly-chlorinated biphenyl (PCBs.) The Sinclair Dump site was denoted as the second worst toxic dump site in New York State (after Love Canal in Niagara Falls, NY) and held the position of being the seventh worse toxic dump site in the United States!

 It was not just because of the notable toxic substances here, but the location so close to a city’s water intact system that raised it to such a elevated level.

Before I left the employ of that wood-shop, I regularly had headaches, nosebleeds and dizzy spells. What did it for me was an incident where I shut off my production line, wandered into the break room for as unscheduled refreshment break. I have a vague recollection of walking up the fire stairs to the roof of this four-storey building with my beverage.
 I had intended to enjoy my soft drink on the roof so the boss would not catch me taking an ‘illegal break.’

I often went there to sit on the skylight which was a knee-high brick wall affair with a pyramid-shaped smoked glass skylight.
 I remember sitting there, hanging my feet over the edge of what I thought was the skylight steppe while sipping from my can of Coca Cola and staring at …a brick(?) below my dangling feet.
A dark reddish rectangle shaped object was slowing coming into focus. As my head cleared I realized that I was staring at the boss’ car, far below! I was sitting on the roof edge of the four storey high building!

 I slowly climbed back onto the roof and sort of realized where I was. I have no real memory of how I got up there or of the almost hour that had passed since I walked away from my job assignment. I knew at that point I had to leave that job. I can’t be day-walking in a place that dangerous. And I was tired of the daily nosebleeds, the headaches and who knows what other harm that place was doing to me.

Shortly after that situation, I did quit that job and moved on. The boss and I had ‘a disagreement’ about a chemical situation that they had been caught doing red-handed. I was not involved, but my testimony was going to be called into interview and the boss very gently told me ‘the company line’ of how he thought I should tell the story. His version of events was in no way at all similar to my understanding of what they had done. In short, -he was suggesting me to lie about something terrible. I did not wish to perjure myself, so I quit the job.

It was only a minimum wage job and not worth the hassle or the danger. I was grateful that a few years later the business closed anyway and the site was condemned, cleaned-up and more-or-less rehabilitated.
It’s still an industrial park today, more of a warehouse for lumber and home-building supplies.

Today, the actual ‘dump site’ which is little more than a wellhead sinkhole in the ground and is surrounded by a chain link fence with POSTED signs around it. Supposedly the site has monitoring devices buried underground.

 Local rumor has it that there are ground vibration sensors and motion detection devices in the area to keep the curious interloper away. It is further said that trespassers are intercepted and asked to vacate the area if they linger too long in the area.

 I walked through the area about 10 years ago and there is a ‘dead zone’ feeling to be there. I distinctly did not enjoy the quiet reverent feeling I felt there. It was like standing in a burial crypt at twilight with the door three-quarters closed. I left the area within minutes and remember the creepy 'weakened' feeling I had from being in that area lasted a long time afterwards.

Science Fiction & Multimedia Conventions

I used to attend and volunteer at various conventions, both here in Toronto but also in Buffalo and Rochester, New York, Erie, Pennsylvania and other cities. I would get to work behind the scenes helping to get various departments set-up and prepare for the fans and guests. It was also a great way to meet the actors backstage.

One of my favorite encounters with a guest was when I chatted with veteran actor Nigel Bennett. Fans may remember him from the Canadian fantasy/crime drama series “Forever Knight” as the evil vampire Lucien Lacroix. He also played a major role in the final two seasons of “LEXX” as an antagonist to the heroes of that series.

Nigel Bennett from Forever Knight, LEXX

 Image by author

When I met him I was unfamiliar with the series “Forever Knight” and backstage while casually discussing the show I said that I had only seen it once or twice. I further stated that I was confused over the plot which seemed to be based in ‘current times’ and in other scenes, maybe a few hundred years ago. A benign if not slightly impolite dismissive on my part that I had thought he would just shrug off and say no more about it.
 But instead, with a enthusiastic gleam in his eyes he regaled me for half an hour with the entire series synopsis!

Starting with the made-for-television movie “Nick Knight” that starred Rick Springfield (yes, the singer) in the title role of Nick Knight, to the later series starring Gerraint Wyn-Davies in the lead with himself at the evil nemesis Lacroix. He charmed me with all the various highlights and milestones from each season thereafter.

 He chatted with me for about a half hour on the subject of the show, the actors and their relationships with each other in the series. I became interested in the show and I vowed to watch it again in earnest. Sadly though, the series was cancelled later that same year just as I was becoming a fan.

I also very much liked actor Jerry Doyle from “Babylon 5” even though I must confess I never liked the series then, or now. I just could not get my head around the series plots even though I did watch a dozen or so concurrent episodes at some point.

Jerry Doyle from Babylon 5

Image credit: author

Apparently Mr. Doyle smokes cigars and someone in the autograph line here in Toronto, having thought ahead, had purchased a genuine Cuban hand-rolled Havana Cigar from one of the many shops here in Canada that legally sells them, and gave it to him as a gift.

 He must have loved it! He kept fondling it, taking out of his shirt pocket occasionally and smelling it as he signed autographs for several more hours.

 You cannot buy or possess anything made in Cuba in the U.S. Nor can you import Cuban Cigars into the United States, even for personal use. America still has an active trade embargo in force against the island nation of Cuba but here in Canada, you can buy Cuban-made products.

Then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger got into a bit of trouble a few years ago crossing back into the U.S. from Canada where he had visited, carrying Cuban cigars. Either he or someone in his entourage tried to bring some home and got caught by U.S. Customs at the border. The contraband cigars were seized by Customs, of course.

As a part of my gofer and security duties, I stayed with Mr. Doyle when he was done signing for the day. He was eager to take this cigar outside and smoke it.
Not knowing the layout of the host hotel, he needed an escort to show him around. I volunteered to walk with him and took him to a quiet back loading dock away from fans and gawkers.

 Here he enjoyed his rare treat in semi-private. We stood around together on the secluded loading dock for about 15 minutes just enjoying the early evening.

 I don’t smoke and I most certainly do not enjoy the second-hand smoke of others but it was an honor, privilege and a true pleasure to share some quiet time with this really neat actor for those few minutes as he enjoyed his cigar. I actually enjoyed the cigar smoke in this case.

So as you might surmise from these random thoughts yes, I have many more things that I could write about. -If only for the caveat if I could find the time!