A pharmacist and a doctor from the Food and Drug Administration in the United States have warned about a potential interaction between ciclosporin and orlistat. They say that the FDA has had six reports of transplant recipients who had subtherapeutic levels of ciclosporin soon after the initiation of orlistat therapy. The authors suggest that orlistat, which increases faecal fat content, reduces absorption of ciclosporin. Until further data are available, transplant patients should take ciclosporin at least two hours before or after orlistat, they recommend (New England Journal of Medicine, 2000;342:1141).