When the prescription weight-loss drug Belviq (lorcaserin) was approved on 27 June, onlookers wondered what had changed. Two years ago, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) rejected the drug because of the possibility that it can damage heart valves, like similar anti-obesity drugs. Had the agency revised its thinking after hearing pleas from obese people who wanted the drug, deciding that the benefits outweighed the risks? "Right now, it's impossible for us to understand how the benefit-risk calculation was conducted," says Marc Boutin, executive vice-president of the National Health Council, a patient-advocacy group in Washington DC.
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