FDA Nixes Obesity Drug Lorcaserin

The FDA has come out with yet another ban. This time the FDA nixes the obesity drug known as Lorcaserin. The drug, developed by Arena Pharmaceuticals was not approved by the FDA, despite high hopes for those with obesity problems. Despite the fact that Obesity is a “epidemic” in the USA, and itself carries both health & self-conscious problems (higher suicide rates, higher unhappiness, etc.) the FDA nixes the Lorcaserin drug. The financial world reacted in an odd manner: Arena Shares actually ended higher, rather than lower. Perhaps the increased marketing received from the denial has helped market the product, but there are other reasons as well.

After all, hopes remain: the group now has a clear path to approval according to the FDA. The FDA was worried about cancerous breast tumors that showed up in trials for rats and not humans. They were also worried that the drug seemed to only have a large effect on diabetic type 2 patients and not average obesity patients. If the company can address these issues in further studies they can gain approval. Even if their approval is only to diabetic patients, that is a growing portion of the American population.

The drug may be one of the first of it’s kind to truly attack the culprit of obesity: appetite. The drug has chemicals that interact with a brain receptor involved in appetite control and making a human feel full. But Arena Pharmaceuticals is not alone in the hunt for the “dieting holy grail”: they face off against Vivus (VVUS) and Orexigen (OREX), and seeing a clearer path to approval may indeed be part of what set their stocks higher, despite the fact the FDA nixes the drug, for now.