New slimming pills on the horizon

SCIENTISTS are working on a new range of slimming pills after the discovery of a gene that causes people to put on weight.

Obesity and overeating are directly linked to an overactive gene, scientists have confirmed.

It is the first time research has established that many people who struggle to control their weight are at the mercy of their genetic make-up.

Findings reveal that at least one in seven people are fat not through their lifestyle but because their genes tell them to over-eat.

Those who carry the genetic variant suffer from an increased appetite, causing them to pile on half a stone more than people without it.

The discovery opens the way to a new range of slimming pills to block the gene.

Britain’s soaring obesity levels are behind a range of serious health problems from diabetes to increased rates of cancer. Around one in four Britons are obese but this is expected to hit one in three in a few decades.

The problem is also endemic in children, leading experts to warn that the long-term health effects will make this the first generation to die at a younger age than their parents.

Obesity

They fear that children growing up fat will suffer from a range of weight-related diseases.

Although scientists thought that genes may be involved in our weight, it was not until 2007 that the FTO “obesity gene” was discovered.

But in the latest discovery, scientists found that it causes people to eat more, resulting in a sluggish metabolism which slows down how fast they burn calories.

Chris Church from the Medical Research Council in Harwell, Oxford, where the study was carried out said: “This study shows that an overactive FTO gene leads people to put on weight. We know that the overactive expression causes them to eat more. But interestingly, having a drug that inhibits the FTO gene might have a greater effect on weight loss than simply helping people lose the extra 3kg that the gene makes them gain.”

The study, funded by the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust, was published in the journal Nature Genetics.

The researchers found that after 20 weeks, female mice with two copies of the FTO gene were 22 per cent heavier than normal female mice, while male mice were 10 per cent heavier.

Dieting pills

The researchers said weight differences in humans with and without the extra copies of the gene would be unlikely to be as large.

Chris Church, a PhD student from the Medical Research Council who worked on the study, said the results were “convincing proof” that the FTO gene caused obesity.

Prof Roger Cox, of the MRC, added: “This gene is novel to obesity research and it is going to be exciting to find out how it works.”

Almost one in three people in the UK is overweight or obese, which can lead to diseases including Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and cancer. The estimated cost of obesity to the NHS is approximately £1 billion a year, with an additional £2.3-£2.6 billion a year to the economy as a whole.