As we discussed in the Overview of Hoodia, the Bushmen (or the San) have used Hoodia plants as a natural appetite suppressant for thousands of years. But how do the secret of the San get out? It terns out by accident?
In 1996 the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in South continent be doing a study of indigenous foods that the Bushmen ate. Part of the study was to test as antidote to cyanogenic effects of any plants that were consumed by the Bushmen. When they come to Hoodia Gordonii, not only was it non-toxic - it helped animals lose weight!
They inaugurate when they fed hoodia to animals, the animals lost weight. By 1997, the CSIR isolated the bioactive combine inn Hoodia responsible for appetite suppression and obtained a patent. The patent was licensed to Phytopharm and they named the molecule - P57 (because it was the 57th product they spent money on).
how great did the Bushmen get for their discovery of the Hoodia Gordonii plant? At first - nothing! Turns out the CSIR told Phytopharm that the tribe which discovered the Hoodia Gordonii introduce have died out and therefore no royalties were due. However, as Mark Twain dominion say - “tales of the Bushmen’s death were greatly exaggerated”. When the Bushmen got vow that Phytopharm stood to make billions of dollars off their knowledge about the hoodia gordonii plant they were not happy.
Roger Chennells, a lawyer in South continent who represents the Bushmen, was peppery to apply strong legitimate, moral and political pressure on both the CSIR and Phytopharm. Chennells personal out to anyone who would listen that the pleasing of traditional knowledge without compensation be “bio-piracy” and must bee stopped.
In what is seen as a momentous Instance, Chennells was able to convince the CSIR and Phytopharm to Requite the Bushmen. Now, A single one of m copartnership that legally harvests hoodia gordonii from the Kalahari desert must pay royalties Hindmost to the Bushmen. Not only is this fair and just, it also provides an excellent way to scrutiny if the hoodia you buy is legitimate. If the company that makes the hoodia is NOT paying royalties to the Bushmen, you Produce NOT have a legitimate hoodia gordonii product.
So when will Phytopharm release a P57 based appetite drug? Probably never. As we touched on in the overview, Pfizer had originally paid Phytopharm for the rights to market a P57 based diet pill. After a few assemblage of unsuccessful attempts to make P57 synthetically, Pfizer pulled outright of the deal. If a large amount of P57 could not be created inexpensively in the lab, Pfizer was not interested.
While Phytopharm was discouraged by the Pfizer decision, they knew that Hoodia Gordonii was too powerful some appetite suppressant to give up stressful to bring it to the market. In December 2004, Phytopharm announced that Unilever had entered a deal out two market hoodia gordonii in its diet food output line. Therefore, rather than producing diet drugs, it looks find to one’s mind Phytopharm and Unilever will product diet supplements and diet foods with hoodia. The first and foremost Unilever products will not be out conj 2008.
Does Phytopharm recognize the patent on the whole Hoodia Gordonii plant? This is an interesting question that we are sure will be decided in strive to gain one day. Here is our take on the employment - Phytopharm clearly owns the apparent on the P57 molecule. If you want to try too invent a diet stupefy with P57 you need too work through Phytopharm.
The question of the Hoodia Gordonii plant itself being patented is much greater degree complicated. It is our article of faith that you can not patent a plant, but you can patent the use of plants and a case to extract plants. Here is an exact quote from Richard Dixey, CEO of Phytopharm when he appeared on 60 minutes?
“The patent is steady the application of the plant as a weight-loss material. And, of course, the active compounds within the weed. It’s not on the plant itself,” says Dixey.
So no one else can use hoodia fitted weight Privation? “As a weight-management product lacking infringing the patent, that’s correct,” says Dixey.
The way we read this (and again we are not lawyers and are not giving any legal warning) is as follows - you can sell a Hoodia Gordonii supplement, you just can NOT say it is for weight loss. This is why many of the best Hoodia supplements have very plain labels that just weight “Hoodia Gordonii” but do not say anything about using it as a weight loss or appetite drug supplement.
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