The Functioning of Hoodia Gordonii

Hoodia Gordonii Plus is also known as hoodia cactus, South African desert cactus, hoodia, Ghaap, khoba, and xhooba etc. Hoodia is a cactus that has become important for its abilities to loose weight. Detailed coverage has been conducted by news channels like BBC, 60 mintutes and ABC.

Hoodia Gordonii Plus can be found in the deserts of South Africa, Angola, Botswana, and Namibia. Hoodia cultivates in bunch and it is not a cactus but a succulent. Hoodia’s flowers appear during the period of five years and the cactus is ready to be yielded. It is the Hoodia gordonii which bears the real hunger repressor although it has other twenty varieties also.

Despite of the fact that the San Bushmen of Kalahari Desert has been consuming for a long time Hoodia has been found lately. During the long traveling from the Bushmen they just cut the stem of the Hoodia and eat it which kills their hunger. The Bushmen also made use of the Hoodia for the tuberculosis, stomach pain, high blood pressure, hemorrhoids, diabetes, indigestion etc.

In the year 1937 one anthropologist from Netherlands who studied human behavior, experimented on San Bushmen people and found that they made use of Hoodia to repress their hunger. In the year 1963 scientists of CSIR which is a South Africa’s laboratory at national level started experimenting Hoodia. The experiments done on the animals showed reduced weight.

The South African scientists working along with British company Phytopharm separated active elements from Hoodia, a steroidal glycoside, which they named as p57. After they get copyrights in the year 1995 they certified p57 to Phytopharm. Phytopharm spent over twenty million dollars on the research work of Hoodia.