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Scientists Find New Painkiller From Saliva

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the hard-to-swallow dept.

dptalia writes "Scientists have found a new pain killer based on human saliva. Apparently 1 gram of the new drug provides as much pain blocking as 3 grams of morphine. The drug blocks the breakdown of the body's natural pain killing mechanism. Scientists say the molecule is simple and synthesis is expected to be simple."

68 of 398 comments (clear)

  1. Make it stop! by LiquidCoooled · · Score: 5, Funny

    When the researchers injected a pain-inducing chemical into rats' paws, 1 gram of opiorphin per kilogram of body weight achieved the same painkilling effect as 3 grams of morphine.

    Well wouldn't you say anything to make them stop spitting on you?

    "No more, yes alright it works I'm not in pain anymore."

    Moving out of cuckoo land, I have a twisted ankle after a fall yesterday should I hock a loogie onto it?

    --
    liqbase :: faster than paper
    1. Re:Make it stop! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      is that why he used his own spit in brokeback mountain

    2. Re:Make it stop! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Funny, but morphine is hardly for ankle twisting pain.

      I've been on several pain management clinics/programs - the last one being pretty much on the cutting edge of medical stuff (lots of experts trained in new stuff who travel worldwide for conferences about pain management and all). I've been taking morphine several times a day for a few years for chronic pain. It sucks. The side effects suck. But it's the only thing that's given me anything close to a "quality of life".

      If it helps to put things in perspective, in the last group (about 20 ppl), when asked if we had honestly thought about ending our lives to make the pain stop, nobody's answered no. Being in excruciating pain each and every second of your life is very hard. You don't get a break when you can't handle it anymore. It's almost like being tortured, and it never ever stops, until the day you die.

      It's a very hard thing to live. Hard to get or keep a job too, when almost half the time you're either in too much pain to be useful for anything or taken too much morphine that you're not "all there" anymore. You can't drive when you're taking the stuff either. Half the docs out there see you as an addict or something. And there's the complications and side effects. And when things happen like you catch a cold or gastro and you vomit, then you can't keep down your morphine either, then things start to go REALLY bad. You gotta to to the hospital, and it's not like they'll just give you a shot no questions asked. Your self-esteem is at an all-time low (no work, feeling worthless and a burden, etc). You can't sleep right. It sucks. Your life sucks. If I didn't have kids to look after, I'd likely have committed suicide a couple years ago just to end the pain.

      Any new pain management method is a godsend. If I could, I'd volunteer to test this stuff for free (worst case scenario, I die, and the pain ends with it).

      That's the daily reality of someone dealing with chronic pain. Morphine isn't just something for addicts and getting high. It makes the lives of millions bearable and worth living. And it's not just for old folks with cancer either - I just turned 30 last month.

    3. Re:Make it stop! by jimbojw · · Score: 5, Funny

      Apparently kissing does make it better.

    4. Re:Make it stop! by Aurisor · · Score: 4, Insightful

      *hug*

    5. Re:Make it stop! by Pollardito · · Score: 2, Funny

      and French kissing makes it even betterer

    6. Re:Make it stop! by shaneh0 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      A lot of other medications have fewer side-effects than Morphine. Among them are CR-Oxycodone, Fentanyl, and dilaudid. There's little benefit to prescribing heroin given all of the other options. In fact, the only clear benefit is price. It's cheaper than all of the drugs I mentioned. And to the large majority, price isn't the biggest concern.

      The real problem is diversion. A significant percentage of all prescribed opiates are diverted to the black market. There are obviously only estimates and anecdotes, but for some drugs (CR OxyCodone) I've seen numbers as high as 30%. The drugs that are diverted the most have more to do with street price than they do with the frequency of prescription. This is why CR OxyCodone is more of a problem than, say, Hydrocodone (Vicodin) or OxyCodone (Percocet).

      It's the opinion of the FDA that heroin would be a nightmare of diversion problems. Furthermore, there isn't a CR form of heroin nor is there, to my knowledge, any Antagonist/Agonist combo that could help prevent diversion. Creation of such a formulary would probably increase the use of prescription heroin but it would cost a lot of money to produce and is, I'm guessing, seen as a risk by the pharma companies due to the serious stigma surrounding the drug.

      In short, there's no clinical need for heroin in our current healthcare system. It's primary advantage (cost) doesn't outweigh it's many disadvantages. This is reinforced by the veritable nightmare of diversion that's plagued CR OxyCodone since it's release in the mid nineties.

    7. Re:Make it stop! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Off Topic, don't care.

      I'm posting as AC for personal reasons. I too was a sufferer of inexplicable chronic pain, but I beat it. My doctor and I worked through a few things, but nothing seemed to work. I cannot comment on all cases, but I can comment on my own. Besides the pain, I suffered from a few other things: chronic insomnia, chronic depression, and obesity. I know now all four were related. I couldn't work out because it hurt too much, which made me fatter, which made it difficult to sleep, which made it hurt more. Eventually I too thought of taking my life just to end the pain, but I did not. I asked my doctor about my depression, and we started treating it in a myriad of ways: exercise, eating healthy, and medication. The exercise was almost unbearable at first, but I stuck with it. I cut out almost all alcohol, fast food, and pre-packaged food. After I lost 40 pounds, I started to sleep better. The pain started to subside, and the meds helped with my depression. I do know that depression can manifest itself as physical pain, and there is no doubt that some of my pain was due to that. After 100 pounds, the day-to-day pain was gone. My fibro-mialga was gone too. After 130 pounds, all pain is gone, and I no longer need the depression meds. I can't say that there was a single cause, but everything together led to a destructive cycle. If you suffer from chronic pain and are overweight and depressed, I suggest massive life changing events. I am a lot happier with myself, though there is some fear that the love of food will take over and put me into another death spiral. Still, I can't live in that fear, and must just keep up with my new life.

    8. Re:Make it stop! by illegalcortex · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Errr, the people who would be taking it? How many drugs do you think got weeded out that might have made you feel fine now but in 10% of the population made the pain permanently worse? Or caused you to be fine but three years later your fingers fall off? Or caused you to have schitzoid delusions, decide the government was trying to poison you through your orange juice and go down to the minimart and start blowing people away?

      There have been some very notable drug failures in the past. It's not just an "off chance", it's a very real possibility. I don't want the next step after animal testing to be the general population. I know it sucks that we ask people with very serious problems to "take one for the team" by waiting 5-10 years. But you have to keep it in perspective. They have benefitted from all the OTHER people in the past who have done the same. The whole reason our medical science has progressed to the point it has is through rigorous scientific testing. If you get stuck with the short term perspective, it seems completely unfair. But you have to see the long term perspective.

      The only cases where I support short circuiting a longer testing phase is for people who are very likely to die from their illness before the process is completed. Chronic pain is on the boundary due to the suicide issue noted. But I think it falls just barely outside, considering many (most?) people go on to live decades after they would have been willing to try experimental drugs that would have had unknown side effects.

    9. Re:Make it stop! by shaneh0 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Suboxone is really a remarkable drug. Unfortunately, due to stigma of other opiates--like, ironically, CR OxyCodone (brand name OxyContin)--the Congress has really crippled the prescription of Suboxone. IIRC, doctors have to have special training to prescribe it and they can only carry a limited number of patients at a given time. A very small number. Something like 30 or so. So it's very limiting, and doctors often have roles of addicts waiting for treatment. Which is tragic if you ask me. People want help but can't get it.

      If you have any opiate dependency issues, I highly recommend looking into Suboxone. It's been described as a "wonder drug." One day you're an addict, doing whatever you can to scrape by, the very next day you're in recovery. No withdrawal. No pain. No suffering.

      Every report I've seen is that it's recidivism rate is much lower than methadone maintenance.

    10. Re:Make it stop! by Hatta · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The real problem is diversion. A significant percentage of all prescribed opiates are diverted to the black market.

      There's an easy solution to this problem. Make opiates available on the white market.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    11. Re:Make it stop! by Hatta · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Except unlike broken glass, nearly all the negative effects of opiates are due to their legal status.

      For example, overdoses are due to people not knowing the strength of the drug. Measured doses of pharmaceutical heroin would fix that. Drug related crime occurs because people can't afford the black market markup. Pharmaceutical morphine costs pennies a dose to manufacture.

      Heroin addiction itself is actually quite benign. It is not toxic to the body, and due to tolerance maintained addicts can function quite well. There's no reason that a person being addicted to heroin should be any more notable than if they were addicted to caffeine. When they don't need to spend all day engaged in drug-seeking behavior addicts can do almost anything a sober person can, such as found Johns Hopkins University.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    12. Re:Make it stop! by shaneh0 · · Score: 2, Informative

      I want to say one more thing about this. There are an estimated 3 million Americans addicted to prescription pain killers. So there's a good chance that at least a couple people reading this can relate.

      I've never met an addict during clinical trials that wouldn't give anything to go back to the beginning and prevent the whole debacle from ever happening. It seems there's a "honeymoon period" while people still have a life, but a persons quality of life dimishes quickly when they're inflicted with the disease of addiction.

      The biggest problem with the "war on drugs" is that it makes people think of addicts as the "enemy" instead of what they are, which is people suffering from a chronic disease.

      I've worked on a Bupenorphine trial and let me tell you: The change in the subjects was remarkable. They came in for 8 hours of tests, evaluations, etc, once a week for six months. One told me "I look at this is trading one day a week in exchange for the other six."

      There have been opiate addicts for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. This is the first time that a real, sensible treatment option is available.

      If you've never tried treatment, if you're afriad of the stigma of comming forward, if you're repulsed by the idea of a "detox facility," if you're turned-off by the methadone clinic, please, search on the SAMHSA website and find a doctor in your area that is certified to prescribe Suboxone. It doesn't always work, and it doesn't work if you don't want it to, but if you're ready to crawl out of this nightmare that the average addict lives in, this is a very good first step.

      The pharmacology is simple. It mixes a synthetic opiate agonist with an antagonist. The agonist has a very long half-life, which most addicts understand to mean one thing: Stability. Instead of the BAC doing roller-coasters, the amount of drug in your system stays constant. Moreover, the antagonist means that you cannot inject the drug w/o going into immediate withdrawal. Anyone familiar with Methadone will find this familiar.

      The major difference is that instead of going to a methadone clinic every day, you get to go to a normal doctors office once a month.

      I've met a lot of addicts. The best I can describe it, is they're normal people that have this enormous amount of scar tissue covering them up. You know that somewhere, underneath, they're a scared, desperate, depressed, lonely person. But society doesn't see that. Society sees the SIDE EFFECTS of their disease, which often is crime.

      Suboxone, along with this epidemic of painkiller abuse, is doing a lot to make the average person realize that addicts are not the guy sleeping by the dumpster, or hanging out in some dark alley way.

      In fact, I personally garauntee that every person reading this knows at least one person addicted to opiates. It could be your teacher, your teller, your butcher, your lawyer, your doctor, your friend, your mother, your brother, even your clergyman. Prescription painkillers have brought addiction from the shadows into the suburbs. This is tragic, but it's got a silver lining. Maybe now we can, as a country, move past stereotypes and into real treatment.

      There was a time when we didn't understand mental illness. So we locked people up that suffered from those ailments.
      And there was a time when we did the same for homosexuality.
      Now, we lock up drug addicts. Eventually, that will change, too.

      Good Luck. Believe me, there are people out there who want to help.

  2. Oh great! by badfish99 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Just when I'd kicked my morphine habit, now I'm going to get jailed for posession of saliva.

    1. Re:Oh great! by digitaldc · · Score: 2, Funny

      Just when I'd kicked my morphine habit, now I'm going to get jailed for posession of saliva.

      Just don't try to bring any saliva to jail in your mouth, it's always the first place they look.

      --
      He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
    2. Re:Oh great! by gEvil+(beta) · · Score: 2, Funny

      Just don't try to bring any saliva to jail in your mouth, it's always the first place they look.

      Good luck trying to find someone who'll shove it up your ass for you...

      --
      This guy's the limit!
  3. I hope it's psychoactive by DrSkwid · · Score: 4, Funny

    'cos morphine rules !!

    I was in hospital one time after an operation and I was on a self administered morhine drip. But it would only give 1mg every 2 minutes (or whatever is the appropriate dose). But the machine also logs how many times you press the button so the staff can see how much pain you think you're in.

    So I wouldn't have to count, I pressed the button every time the track changed on my mp3 player. Best hospital visit evar!!!1

    I was lying there one time, opened my eyes and the Everquest HUD was there. In the chat window I was being spammed with :

    You need to go to the toilet.
    You need to go to the toilet.
    You need to go to the toilet.
    You need to go to the toilet.

    Eventually I went and everybody who spoke on the journey, their chat came up in the window.

    It was ace.

    When they checked the machine they asked me if I was in a lot of pain, I ust said "no I like the morphine" and we all had a laugh. Until they took it off me.

    Then they gave me these awful morphine based tablets and they gave me a bad trip so I stopped taking them.

    --
    There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
    1. Re:I hope it's psychoactive by djtachyon · · Score: 4, Funny

      You know you waste your life on an MMO when ...

      --
      "What's the use of a good quotation if you can't change it?" - Doctor Who
    2. Re:I hope it's psychoactive by 93,000 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Very true. Around 15 yrs ago my father was on morphine for nearly a year for chronic pain, and had no trouble going off. As his doctor said back then (perhaps not so scientifically): The pain uses up all of the drug, so there's none leftover to get addicted on.

      --
      Sweet informative mod.
    3. Re:I hope it's psychoactive by Johnboi+Waltune · · Score: 2, Insightful

      People take it to self-medicate for emotional pain, which can be every bit as agonizing as physical pain. I would even say it's basically impossible to take morphine when one "doesn't need it". It's a painkiller, and people take it for many types of pain.

      A drug addict doesn't take drugs to get high, he takes them because he can't tolerate being sober. A person who's problem is only a broken arm or whatever has no problem being sober; he just doesn't want his arm to hurt. When the arm stops hurting, his need for the drug goes away.

      --
      "The advanced societies of the future will be driven by competing systems of psychopathology." -JG Ballard
  4. New Flash: Drooling idiots worth more then Google! by Wacky_Wookie · · Score: 2, Funny

    The scientists never think these things through, do they? This is going to create huge problems for school discipline. Now whenever students are caught shooting spit balls at other students they can claim they were just implanting an airborne pain killer delivery system.

    "But I was just helping Anne's neck pain..."

  5. Ready and Willing by Philotic · · Score: 2

    [X] I am willing to test mankinds new potent pain killer.

    I have.. migraines... on occasion...

  6. Saliva? by onion2k · · Score: 5, Funny

    Saliva is a painkiller? How come I have toothache then?

    --
    http://twitter.com/onion2k
    1. Re:Saliva? by The_Noid · · Score: 4, Informative

      It's because the salvia can't get inside the tooth, where your pain is. You should try drilling a hole in it, so the salvia can reach the pain...

    2. Re:Saliva? by bigdavex · · Score: 2, Informative

      I think it needs to go into the blood stream. Therefore, you (or a friend) should bite your arm.

      --
      -Dave
  7. Going back to the old days? by malkavian · · Score: 5, Interesting

    So, the behaviour observed in animals where they lick wounds, and even in humans, that 'kiss it better' (introduce saliva to the wound), or suck on a sore wound to make it feel better, by instinct, hasn't given the clue that there's something in saliva that helps?
    There's a whole store of herb and animal lore that's been systematically quashed for decades (well, since the great witch hunts really), and science is only just getting round to looking at it now.
    There's a lot to be said for 'complimentary' medicine for lesser ailments (although the modern pharmaceutical treatments are definitely magnitudes more effective for front line serious treatment). Rather than just decrying it, perhaps it should be investigated more thoroughly?

    1. Re:Going back to the old days? by Manchot · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Given that the drug appears to be newly discovered, it is probably present only in small concentrations in saliva. Saliva by itself probably doesn't have any painkilling effect. However, since there are many enyzmes present in saliva, sucking and/or spitting on a wound does still have the beneficial effect of cleaning it.

    2. Re:Going back to the old days? by lachlan76 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Actually, I believe that the instinct to lick a wound is because saliva contains Lysozyme, which makes it easier for white blood cells to engulf a bacterium. Its presence in tears is one of the reasons that you cry when you get something in your eyes.

    3. Re:Going back to the old days? by value_added · · Score: 5, Interesting

      So, the behaviour observed in animals where they lick wounds, and even in humans, that 'kiss it better' (introduce saliva to the wound), or suck on a sore wound to make it feel better, by instinct, hasn't given the clue that there's something in saliva that helps?

      I've been moaning about that for years, and without exception, every pet owner and every vet considered me nuts. I noticed that if you lay a plate of food on the ground and have a dog lick it clean, a thin clear coating builds up on the surface of the plate. Give it a day or two, and washing the plate hot soapy water doesn't remove the coating as you'd think it would.

      Mind you I don't know what's in saliva, and as this article suggests, few have stopped to consider the subject long enough to study it. What I do know is that the standard procedure of treating a dog for an injury or skin problem involves topical antiobiotics in combination with a cone that's placed over the dog's head (if a dog has any self respect, it's lost in minutes after the cone goes on). Licking, according to established wisdom, defeats the purpose, infects the wound or injury, saliva is full of germs, blah blah blah. Dogs have been around longer than veterinary medicine, and I doubt there's many wild animals that have membership in an HMO. Put another way, they've been doing fine for longer than we know. And for reasons we can only hope to discover. I let my own dogs lick any itches or wounds they have, and have yet to find something that hasn't healed as it should. I can't say the same for pets of relatives and friends who went the cone-head route.

      I could add something on how oral sex relates to the topic at hand, but instead I'll continue with Stuff I Learned About Dogs that similarly runs contrary to a veterinary advice, established wisdom, or published literature. I expect Science will catch up to this, as it will in other areas.

      1. Dogs don't need a lot of water. Unless you feed them a steady diet of dried corn meal packaged up as dog food.

      2. Dogs don't need or want a steady diet, and feeding your dog "table scraps" (aka "real food") doesn't cause upset and diarrhea. By comparison, if you eat nothing but Corn Flakes every day for 10 years, chances are an ordinary hamburger will cause problems.

      3. Dogs are creatures of habit, but seek out a change in regimen when possible. Don't feed your dog in a bowl. Hide the food around the house and make them search for it. Great fun. Even better, roll some soft-boiled eggs across the kitchen floor and let them catch their food. The expression on their face after that first bite is priceless.

      4. If given the opportunity, dogs will discover they enjoy fruits and many vegetables (green leafy stuff being the exception, and apples and tomatoes perennial favourites). The best food for dogs is pizza. Yeah, pizza. Pizza has lots of fat (more important than protein for any active dog), it's chewy (all dogs like to chew), and if there's lots of toppings, the scavenger instinct is satisfied. Best served warm, of course.

      Obviously, I have way too much free time on my hands. Maybe I can become a scientist.

    4. Re:Going back to the old days? by Shaper_pmp · · Score: 3, Insightful

      "There's a whole store of herb and animal lore that's been systematically quashed for decades (well, since the great witch hunts really), and science is only just getting round to looking at it now."

      Make that "a whole store of vague, sometimes contradictory waffle that only intermittently produces results with absolutely no theoretical underpinnings to explain why, how or when it works".

      And no-one's quashing anything - if you want to go out on the winter solstice and rub a badger on your varicose veins nobody's stopping you - just don't expect to be able to get it on the National Health Service (or private healthcare, for those countries without a functioning public healthcare system) without the slightest bit of scientific evidence that it's safe and it works.

      There are a lot of advances still to be (re-)discovered in traditional herbal and animal lore around the world - of this there is no doubt. Unfortunately there's also a whole load of dangerous horseshit dressed up as traditional lore too, so as a society we don't tend to give credence to a piece of lore until it's been scientifically tested (and ideally until we have some theory as to why it works).

      This isn't "quashing" or "destroying" anything - it's called being sensibly prudent. We observe an effect, study it and then use it when we're sure it's safe and effective.

      Recall that most of this "store of herbal and animal lore" was discovered by feeding patients a variety of random items and watching for the ones who didn't die horribly from an infection or allergic reaction.

      --
      Everything in moderation, including moderation itself
    5. Re:Going back to the old days? by smellsofbikes · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Other people have already made some relevant points but I figured I'd add mine.
      Licking wounds is better than no treatment whatsoever, which is what dogs got prior to the invention of medicine.
      Medicine can be better than either no treatment *or* licking wounds.
      Evolution has given the dogs a set of responses; human ingenuity has come up with better ones, but the dogs still have their responses wired-in. Hence the satellite-dish-head.
      Conventional wisdom says that open wounds should be covered and slathered in antibiotics. I've found that my injuries recover more quickly and with less scarring if carefully cleaned and then left open to the air, which might be because I live in a very dry, very high-altitude, very clean environment. But those are a special set of circumstances and I wouldn't advise other people to try this blindly, without experimenting. Ditto dogs licking wounds: it could help, it could hurt, but it's known to be counterproductive to healing up stitched wounds. Don't assume that your results are universally true.

      My dog would give her left ovary for cooked carrots.

      By the way, about the water: amimal metabolism is the process of converting hydrocarbons and carbohydrates to water and carbon dioxide. When you eat, you need water to provide some of the initial hydrogens that serve as electron donors in the mitochondria, but as soon as you've digested some of the food you start producing water as a waste by-product and that serves to fill your future needs. So, if you eat small amounts, slowly, you don't need to drink as much water, but if you eat a bunch in a rush you'll be thirsty. Same goes with dogs.

      --
      Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
  8. show of hands by brunascle · · Score: 2, Funny

    how many people thought that said salvia?

  9. Well, that's another problem licked by Bazzargh · · Score: 3, Funny

    Sorry, it had to be said.

  10. Re:Those poor rats by jez9999 · · Score: 5, Funny

    The rats? What about those poor bacteria in the saliva, just being sacrificed so the scientists could make the painkiller? There were probably more bacteria in there, eradicated, than there were humans that ever lived!

    --
    == Jez ==
    Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
  11. Sweet by Timesprout · · Score: 4, Funny

    I am going to claim saliva addiction and start snogging every good looking girl I see for the rest of the afternoon.

    --
    Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
    What truth?
    There is no dupe
  12. Re:Those poor rats by MightyYar · · Score: 5, Funny

    I hate rats. I'll buy a product based on how many more rats they killed during testing then the nearest competitor.

    Next up, little rat-like dogs. Can we require medical testing on those?

    I'm completely against animal testing on cute little fuzzy bunnies and cool dogs, like golden retrievers. I'm against testing on some monkeys, but others you can go for it - like that little brown bastard that threw feces on me at the zoo. Give him monkey-AIDS.

    Also, I never buy bug repellent that has been tested on mosquitoes. The slaughter must stop!

    --
    W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
  13. War on Drugs by MightyYar · · Score: 3, Funny

    Easy to synthesize.

    Made from saliva.

    Well, the "War on Drugs" is about to get interesting. Have you had you mouth drained by a government-approved suction center yet today? "Today the police knocked over another spit house..."

    (I know, I know, synthesize means they don't need actual saliva... just trying to be funny.)

    --
    W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
  14. 3 grams of morphine? (!) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I understand they might be comparing relative potency, but comparing to THREE GRAMS of morphine is kinda excessive.

    300 mg morphine will render just about any human being unconscious and apnoeic pretty quickly.

    3000 mg will knock you out cold, stop you breathing, and drop your blood pressure precipitously, more or less instantaneously.

    In which sense, numerous things have have the same pain-killing effect as three grams of morphine.

    Being hit by a freight train, for instance.

    1. Re:3 grams of morphine? (!) by Nakoruru · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yes, but the dosage of freight train required is a lot bigger.

  15. Hold off on the stock buying by paiute · · Score: 4, Informative

    They isolated a peptide which inhibits two enzymes that chew up enkephalins, the body's natural pain killers. Inhibiting these makes the naturally-released enkephalins hang around longer. The problem is that peptide drugs have a checkered history. See the article linked below.

    http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/060586510 3v1

    --
    If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
  16. Re:Those poor rats by RationalRoot · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You know it's just wrong for a post that starts with "When we complain about how aliens probe our anuses" to be modded insightful.

    However I think you will find that man's inhumanity to animals is usually pretty unimaginitive compared with mans inhumanity to man.

    Generally you don't have people getting really emotional about hurting animals, not like the way they get all involved in hurting other people.

    --
    http://davesboat.blogspot.com/
  17. Re:Indeed by Ginger+Unicorn · · Score: 5, Insightful

    i think its not so black and white. if you were about to die of cancer and some scientists said they could synthesise a cure by torturing a cage full of rabbits would you want them to? Even though its a horrible choice i cant see that i would choose to die.

    on the other hand, testing something so trivial as make up on an animal doesnt have any ethical justification that i can discern. then there's the sliding scale in between.

    --
    (1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons
  18. No, really, an important point by kria · · Score: 4, Insightful

    More than the idea of reducing the quantity required, the question is whether this substance can block pain without having addictive qualities. That's a very important question, I think, and one that it seems they don't have the info on yet, because I can't imagine them leaving it out if they knew.

    1. Re:No, really, an important point by TinCanFury · · Score: 2, Funny

      People selfishly swallowing gallons of their own saliva, drinking juices in between just to get their next kick... Oh god, I hope the Republicans take over congress again so they can attack this scourge to society.

      Think of the children! Defenseless, even on school yards! We will need to increase the number of police on the streets with packs of flour to stuff into people's mouths to prevent prevent them from getting high.

    2. Re:No, really, an important point by wobblie · · Score: 5, Insightful

      THC has little to no addictive qualities. It is perverse how something one could grow in ones backyard, for free, is of the highest criminality, yet somehow we feel a need to come up with something else - usually not as good - that requires an entire industrial infrastructure. While it is not hard to understand the reasons for this sad state of affairs, it is still ... sad.

    3. Re:No, really, an important point by CrankyOldBastard · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I'd like to add an informed opinion about this point of view:

      I have Brachial Plexus Neuropathy. 10 years ago I got a MRSA infection following a Bankart Repair of my right shoulder. It took 3 months to clear up the infection, and in that time the cords of my right Brachial Plexus were damaged. Now I live in 24 hour constant pain, somewhat as if my arm is being torn off (it isn't).

      I take Oxycontin twice a day, with Endone (more oxycodone) as a top up in the case of breakthrough. I go to my Pain Specialist every 6 weeks and get a series of nerve block injections, which give me 3 to 5 days relief (not counting the relatively minor discomfort of having 2 inch needle driven into my shoulder and spine).

      I've found that light use of cannabis does increase the efficacy of the oxy. Too much (i.e. being "stoned") and it can be that the senses are heightened, which is a very very bad thing. Use every day diminishes the effectiveness.

      I've found that occasional use (when I don't want to take anymore oxy but I have to get more relief or jump in front of a bus) works well. But grass is not that effective a painkiller on it's own, and seems to me to be most effective because (a) the spatial and temporal distortions can make the pain less important (i.e. it can relieve suffering but not so much pain) and (b) it increases the effects of the opiate based medicines.

  19. Re:Indeed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful
    "...or ridicule those who do."
    Very few people are actually in favor of gratuitous cruelty to animals. The widespread disdain you encounter is rooted in subliminal revulsion at a values system that fails to value humans more than animals. You undoubtedly view yourself as more civilized and humane than people who don't share your values. After complaining for the umpteenth time how barbaric the world is because of animal testing, stop and consider the possibility that maybe your promotion of an absolutely valid aesthetic concern out of proportion to more serious problems is just ludicrous tunnel vision. You want to stand against barbarism? Let's talk about war, poverty, police brutality and a host of other matters. STFU about the damned animals already.
  20. Milligrams, not grams. by Aryman · · Score: 4, Informative

    BBC got it right: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6142842.stm

  21. Re:Indeed by indifferent+children · · Score: 5, Insightful
    such horror and cruelty

    I have a friend who is a neuro-oncology researcher. A very large part of her job is: causing cancer in rats, killing those rats, and sectioning their brains. Horror may be in the eye of the beholder, but she does not practice cruelty. The rats are killed by being placed into a box with CO2 (from a dry-ice chamber). That's probably a more peaceful death than I can expect.

    Granted, when you are researching pain meds, there's probably going to be pain involved. But that doesn't mean than the researchers get any pleasure out of causing this pain, or that they cause any more pain than necessary.

    If you truly feel that a rat life is worth as much as a human life, or that an hour of rat pain is as bad as an hour of human pain, then it is hard to justify your continued existence. Even if you are as green as you can get, and a hard-core vegan, your ecological footprint is very large (certainly compared to a rat), and responsible for the deaths of many small animals. The fact that you use a computer means that your carbon footprint is not that of a primitive hunter-gatherer. If you eat vegetables and/or grains, you are responsible for the deaths of several small mammals (such as fieldmice) and thousands of insects every week, just from the mechanical harvesting process (even assuming that your food is 'organic' and thus pesticide-free.

    --
    Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it. --Mark Twain
  22. Re:Those poor rats by Dersaidin · · Score: 2

    But what if more rat kills means its not as safe for you?

  23. Re:Indeed by Mprx · · Score: 3, Informative

    Try inhaling some CO2 yourself, it's very painful. I don't oppose killing rats, but it would be better to suffocate them with pure nitrogen or something. Lack of oxygen is not painful.

  24. Re:Indeed by cheater512 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Why yes we can advance science in other ways!

    Just sign these release papers and we'll get the 'advancement' started. :)

  25. RTFA, please. by Dion · · Score: 4, Informative

    They didn't inject 3g of morphine in a human.

    They didn't even inject 3g of morphine in a rat.

    What they found was that 3 grams of morphine per kg body weight is about as potent as 1 gram of morphine per kg body weight of the new saliva substance.

    --
    -- To dream a dream is grand, but to live it is divine. -- Leto ][
  26. Re:Indeed by Shawn+is+an+Asshole · · Score: 3, Funny

    Or suffocate them with nitrous oxide. Let them go out laughing...

    --
    "It ain't a war against drugs.it's a war against personal freedom" --Bill Hicks
  27. Re:Indeed by mutube · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Very true. Relevant bit from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CO2 for info.

    Bicarbonate ions are crucial for regulating blood pH. As breathing rate influences the level of CO2 in blood, too slow or shallow breathing causes respiratory acidosis, while too rapid breathing, hyperventilation, leads to respiratory alkalosis.

    It is interesting to note that although it is oxygen that the body requires for metabolism, it is not low oxygen levels that stimulate breathing, but is instead higher carbon dioxide levels. As a result, breathing low-pressure air or a gas mixture with no oxygen at all (e.g., pure nitrogen) leads to loss of consciousness without subjective breathing problems. This is especially perilous for high-altitude fighter pilots, and is also the reason why the instructions in commercial airplanes for case of loss of cabin pressure stress that one should apply the oxygen mask to oneself before helping others--otherwise one risks going unconscious without being aware of the imminent peril.

    If you're going to kill through suffocation, there are few more cruel ways than using CO2.
    --
    Python coder | PyQt Applications | Writer
  28. YES! by Greyfox · · Score: 5, Funny
    And here I thought no one understood the plight of the poor malaria mosquito! These once proud creatures roamed the plains by the billions and now due to human eradication programs and bats they're down to mere hundreds of millions! If this continues we could see the end of the malaria mosquito in our great-great-great-great-great grandchildren's time! We owe it to them to preserve this awesome predator! Look at all the contributions the malaria mosquito has brought to us! Without the malaria mosquito we wouldn't have gin and tonic! Without the malaria mosquito the colonial British would have had literally no opposition to taking over the world! We must all do our part to save the malaria mosquito!

    As for the small rat-like dogs, I'm afraid they're pretty much worthless even for cruel and inhumane experiments. However, you can still feed them to coyotes. Coyotes are cool dogs like golden retrievers and they eat small rat-like dogs! They go through poodles like I go through popcorn. Yay coyotes! Alligators are no good though. Sure they eat small rat-like dogs and the occasional resident from Florida but they're cold blooded and you know they're trying to bring back the dominance of the dinosaur. I suggest we genetically engineer crocodiles to have warm blood and fur. That'd show them!

    --

    I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?

    1. Re:YES! by Gordonjcp · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I suggest we genetically engineer crocodiles to have warm blood and fur. That'd show them!

      That would be a cat, then.

  29. Re:Those poor rats by Morphine007 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Though many people would seem to be of the opinion that animal life is more important than human life... to them I would suggest that they put "their money where their mouth is" and feed themselves to the nearest pit-bull.

    If you (not you eighty4) revere animal life as being so sacred, and consider human life to be as base as it gets, then perhaps you should attempt to remedy that situation by, as I said, feeding yourself to an animal... or is animal life only more important than human life when that human life is not your own?

    These are not labs full of megalomaniacs remaniscent of the Joker from Batman, methodically torturing poor kittens and other small furry animals. They're performing scientific tests with as much humanity as they can. The fact that these tests, if performed upon a human, would still be cause for riots and lynching is an unfortunate by-product of the world we live in and the diseases these researchers are trying to cure.

    If suddenly it were determined that rats were actually sentient on more than a simple stimulus-response with limited memory, then I'm sure you'd have a LARGE number of researchers who would repent and find another animal whose self-awareness is more in doubt. If you think that this is cruel and calculating, well... in a way... you're right. Welcome to the real world, it's not all rainbows and songbirds.

    --
    Oh god, that woman is John Romero!
  30. Unlikely proposition by ajs318 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I find it doubtful that you could have an effective painkiller that wasn't usable recreationally.

    The human body's pain regulatory system is tightly bound up with a behaviour-rewarding system. Certain actions which are evolutionarily beneficial (to the species or the tribe, even if not to the individual) trigger a release of endorphins, the body's own homebrew morphine analogues which are also produced in response to pain. When an individual is not in pain, stimulation of the endorphin receptors produces a highly pleasurable sensation.

    Opiates such as morphine or heroin are chemically similar enough to endorphins to bind to the same receptors. This makes them good painkillers. It also makes them good ways to induce pleasurable sensations for recreational purposes.

    Beside any psychological effect (which may well be habit-forming in its own right), continued over-use of opiates can cause a reduction in the body's endorphin production. When the artificial painkillers wear off, the body is not ready with natural painkillers and so normal bodily functions produce heightened sensations -- the blood can be felt flowing through arteries, the ends of bones can be felt moving past one another, and so on. The exact manifestation of symptoms is a person-to-person variable. Most people find this state unbearable and so seek out more opiates rather than wait for the body's endorphin production to stabilise. This is physical dependence (the body cannot function normally without drugs). At £1 a breath, a heroin habit is not a cheap habit unless you are a rich rock star.

    Some people have found that they can naturally produce endorphins in more than sufficient quantities to mask pain, and actually deliberately harm themselves to trigger an endorphin release. (Gripping ice cubes tightly in the hands is one of the least-dangerous ways to cause temporary pain sensations and so trigger endorphin production, and is recommended by some agencies for persistent self-harm practitioners). Others have found that by deliberately performing (what they perceive to be) altruistic acts (such as helping an old lady across the road, whether or not she actually wants to cross the road), they can stimulate endorphin production.

    Unless the pain-relieving and pleasure-inducing properties of endorphins are separable, any painkiller that attempts to mimic their action will be both usable recreationally and doubly habit-forming.

    --
    Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
  31. Re:Indeed by DougReed · · Score: 3, Funny

    I can't get the picture out of my mind of a rat being tortured with make up. I picture researchers putting some gastly shade of eye makeup on a female rat and watching to see if she can get a date with a male rat.

    I suspect alcohol is involved, which would explain the current ghastly shades of eye makeup available for human women. Don't the researchers realize that after a few cold ones, the male rats could care less about the eye makeup?

  32. Re:Indeed by Ginnungagap42 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Inconvenient? Like polio or pertussis or plague?

    Having worked in both the biotechnology and computer programming fields, I can tell you that there is not going to be a computer simulation that is good enough to obviate the need for all animal testing anytime soon. Biological systems are way too complex to accurately model. Also, there are almost always unexpected synergistic effects with new drugs. Of course, it is ridiculous to test a new hairspray on a rabbits eyes - we pretty much know what's going to happen there.

    Most people who work in biotechnology are not the sadistic torturers you might think. One time in the lab I worked in, an animal tech didn't check all the mouse cages before a rack of cages went through the autoclave. There was a mouse left in one of the cages. The mouse most likely died a horrible and painful death. The tech was devestated about the mouse, and resigned even before she could be fired (which was the lab's policy if anyone was shown to have committed any animal cruelty).

    Most reputable laboratories go to great lengths to ensure the comfort of the animals being tested. But the hard fact is that it is more ethical to test new drugs and procedures on animals than it is on humans.

    Another thing that nobody on the Animal Rights side of the issue seems to mention is that a lot of this kind of testing furthers veterinary science. I have a 14-year-old dog that we rescued from a shelter when she was a pup. She is currently sporting two TPLO operations: one on each knee and is taking an antiinflammetory drug for arthritis. Both this surgery and the drug were experimental at one time, but thanks to science my dog is living out her final days in relative comfort rather than having to be put to sleep several years ago.

  33. its not that the aliens probed my anus.. by Suchetha · · Score: 2, Funny

    .. its that they didn't even BOTHER to call me after that.

    --

    learn from yesterday, plan for tomorrow, party tonight
    or one out of three ain't bad
  34. Re:Indeed by Glyphn · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The rats are killed by being placed into a box with CO2 (from a dry-ice chamber). That's probably a more peaceful death than I can expect.

    Aside: I'm not against animal research, but as a former animal researcher who euthanized rodents I have to say that this is a rotten way to kill animals. CO2 euthanasia is not quick, the animals are clearly in distress (they die gasping for air, clawing at the container edges, rolling in their urine and feces). I can only imagine that CO2 has become popular because it sounds nice--you know, you put the animals to sleep with some gas that they breath all the time anyway.

    Better by far is cervical dislocation--a quick snap of the neck and the animal falls senseless. Unfortunately, that practice is increasingly viewed as barbaric and is discouraged in many places. It's a strange world we live in where we care less about the actual suffering of the animal than how humane we appear to be.

  35. Re:Those poor rats by MightyYar · · Score: 3, Funny

    Ouch, I hadn't thought that through.

    It still might be worth it.

    --
    W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
  36. You may have a conscience... by emil · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...but let me assure you that mother nature doesn't.

    Can you imagine the pain of being eaten by a large predator? Remember that man's evolutionary ancestors were not always at the top of the food chain; predation has certainly touched you.

    Also, the venoms of poisonous animals have evolved to increase pain, allowing the predator to more effectively incapacitate the victim.

    Just because mankind removes itself from the sadistic slaughter of the world does not mean that the slaughter itself abates. No matter how violent and predatory we may imagine ourselves to be, we are amateurs compared to what nature has produced.

  37. Re:That's the theme of an old Harlan Ellison story by jahudabudy · · Score: 2, Informative

    Maybe you're thinking of "I have no Mouth but I must Scream"? It confronts the idea of eternal suffering. Pretty bleak stuff.

    --
    ...sometimes, in order to hurt someone very badly, you have to tell that person terrible lies. - PA
  38. Disturbing that this was modded "Informative" by EComni · · Score: 2, Funny

    What if some little kid who doesn't know any better has a toothache, and this poor kid comes across this Slashdot post labeled "Informative" and subsequently thinks that drilling a hole in his aching tooth with his dad's powerdrill is the smartest idea ever? Did you think of this all-too-possible scenario, mods?

    Please think of the children.

  39. New crime by Tablizer · · Score: 2, Funny

    Oh great, muggers are now gonna hit us over the head and cut our tungues off for drug extraction.

    --
    Table-ized A.I.