Therapy failure highlights difficulties of tricking the body into shedding pounds.

Efforts to hold back the world's expanding waistline have been dealt another blow this week, as scientists announce disappointing results from a clinical trial of their latest obesity drug.

The test shows that the drug, developed by Merck & Co, Inc. in New Jersey and named MK-0557, works — but only a little bit. Overweight or obese patients receiving MK-0557 lost only 1.6 kilograms more than those who were given a placebo over the course of a year.

The results, reported in this month's issue of Cell Metabolism, are statistically significant. But they are also clinically irrelevant.

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