Hoodia shines in 60 Minutes spotlight

Hoodia shows much promise in worldwide weight loss studies

Hoodia got major exposure on Nov. 21, 2004 when 60 minutes aired the segment “African Plant May Help Fight Fat” in which Correspondent Lesley Stahl ate a piece of Hoodia and proclaimed that she was not hungry for the entire day and had no ill effects from the plant. This 60 minutes show may have been when many people first herd about this plant but the first scientific investigation of the plant was conducted at South Africa’s national laboratory in a study of indigenous foods over 30 years ago in which they found when they fed it to animals, the animals ate it and lost weight. Tests on Hoodia have been done since then with great results. One test was performed in Leicester, England, where volunteers were isolated with only newspapers, television and food. Half the group took Hoodia Gordonii and the other half was given a placebo. After 15 days, the Hoodia group had reduced their food intake by 1000 calories a day. With the average persons daily diet being around 2200 calories, this was a great success! More recently, in two double-blind studies (the only proof accepted by the established scientific community) lean and obese laboratory rats were given Hoodia which strongly suppressed their appetites and caused major weight loss in the obese rats and moderate appetite suppression and weight loss in the lean rats. Hoodia also induced a modest drop in the rats’ blood sugar levels, and no adverse side effects were reported.