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Khashayar Sakhaee, Naim M. Maalouf, Dietary Calcium, Obesity and Hypertension—The End of the Road?, The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, Volume 90, Issue 7, 1 July 2005, Pages 4411–4413, https://doi.org/10.1210/jc.2005-1004
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Obesity is recognized as one of the most significant public health burdens, and its prevalence continues to escalate in most industrialized nations. Over the past two decades, many pharmacological drugs have been developed to affect body weight through appetite suppression or by intestinal lipase inhibition. Several of these medications have fallen into disfavor due to limited efficacy and/or significant side effects. Continued efforts have been made to develop safe and effective therapies to induce and maintain weight loss. If proven to reduce fat mass, calcium would be one such safe and simple dietary supplement to accomplish this goal. Moreover, calcium supplementation may be beneficial in the treatment of hypertension because dietary calcium intake is also postulated to be an important determinant of blood pressure. The mechanism(s) by which calcium plays a pathogenetic role in weight control, energy balances, and hypertension is not fully understood. The negative clinical study published in this issue of the journal by Reid et al. (1) raises an interesting question as to whether we are at the crossroads, at the end of the road, or whether we should move to a new beginning.
