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Cocaine Vaccine In the Works
martyros writes "Researchers at the Baylor College of Medicine are performing clinical trials of a vaccine that teaches the immune system to attack cocaine, preventing it from giving a high. The vaccine is made by attaching inactivated cocaine molecules to the outside of inactivated cholera proteins. When the immune system attacks the cholera proteins, it also 'learns' the cocaine molecules as well. The result is that the immune system 'recognizes the potent naked drug when it's ingested. The antibodies bind to the cocaine and prevent it from reaching the brain, where it normally would generate the highs that are so addictive.'" An earlier story from The Star notes that human trials for vaccines against both cocaine and nicotine are well under way.
I hope this wundervacine will not attach to some of the body's natural painkillers.
Would you vaccinate your child ?
Shakespeare poems - infinite monkeys with infinite time.Computer tech support - a few trained ones working from 9 to 5.
I'd like some anti-freeze to drink afterwards, please.
ZOMG I'msoexcitedtohearaboutthis I'vebeenwaiting suchalongtimeforsomething tohelpmekickthiscrazycravingand theallnightravingand theallnightdancingandtheclubs withthecrappytechnomusic ZOMGisthatablacksquirrel whenisOprahcomingonmyheartispounding wherecanIbugythisvaccine!
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
How would this work as an alternative to drug testing? If the vaccines for various drugs were easily obtained (say, 10 years from now), then could potential employers, private schools, and such require the vaccines instead of requiring testing as they do now? Would this be better or worse?
The orgasm releases neurotransmitters that are similar to cocaine. Perhaps those vaccinated against cocaine would never have orgasms, or reduced orgasms. In fact, dopamine is critical for a lot of enjoyment. Maybe this will spawn a 'deadheading' procedure. Piss off the wrong person or government and you will never enjoy anything ever again. You wouldn't even want revenge, there would be no joy in it.
On the other hand, a sperm vaccine would be a nice alternative to having your tubes tied. Of course, there's the nightmare scenario where this treatment latches onto a live bit of cholera or whatever and spreads, neutering all humans.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Wasn't this a subplot of Neuromancer or something, where the main character was forcibly taken away from his various addictions by having his liver modified to not process the various chemicals?
gay
It's being developed for use in drug rehab programs. For people who want to quit, but are having difficulty, or have quit, but might relapse, this could be incredibly helpful. Of course, most of the discussion is around the potential to use this as a preventative measure, which is a very different issue.
Oh, great. Cocaine prohibition produced crack cocaine and meth, crackdowns on ingredients to make ecstacy produced PMA, heroin prohibition produces all sorts of gross things, etc., etc. Cocaine is actually one of the safer stimulants out there (compared to its main rivals, crack and meth, which emerged due to cocaine's astronomical price thanks to prohibition). This insane drug whack-a-mole game is producing even more deadly and impure drugs. While we could be ingesting small and known quantities of pure marijuana, MDMA, cocaine, opiates, shrooms, and LSD, we're instead ingesting unknown quantities of who-knows-what. Most drug deaths are caused by adulterants, not the pure drug itself.
What makes you think "puritans" are behind this?
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
From what I understand about drug addiction and attempts to kick the habit, you won't just "lose interest", you'll be going through living hell for quite a while - your body is looking for something you're not giving it, it's going to be pretty mad at you. This is why people relapse - they remember the shiny happy times, ignore that bad bits about those times and it all looks so much better than what they're in at the moment, so they go back to their drug.
If you use this vaccine, then that becomes impossible, you burn that bridge. But that doesn't remove the desire to be back on drugs, it just removes your favourite one from the list of possibilities. There's still plenty of others around and I think it's pretty safe to say that people who were going to relapse anyway will do so with or without the vaccine - the only thing that will change is the drug they'll use. So that'll be a statistic to look for: What percentage of people trying to give up Cocaine on this vaccine will end up on another drug? Compare this to a control group of people not on vaccine ending up going back to cocaine.
I'm deadly serious.
Used as an involuntary jab to fight the idiotic 'war on drugs' it is a clear violation of civil and cognitive liberty (I'm using that phrase more and more these days, not something I'm happy about). Used as part of a rehab programme, it kills the drug use without addressing the underlying weakness of character that created the addict. They are likely to fuck themselves up in some other way.
There isn't always, and shouldn't always be, a quick fix.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
The anti-smoking vaccine, NicVax, is in phase 2B clinical testing, and appears to work. Sort of: "High antibody responders (top 30%) continued to show statistically significant abstinence at nine months: 9-Month continuous abstinence rate: NicVAX=20% (12/61, p=0.0076) vs. Placebo=6% (6/100)" That's not impressive, yet it's better than most anti-smoking programs.
Nicotine addiction is the toughest one to break. Programs for getting people off cocaine are about 40% successful. Programs for getting people off smoking are about 10-20% successful. Also, addicts tend to "age out" of cocaine and heroin addiction; after age 40, most of them eventually give it up. Not nicotine; people smoke their way to the grave.
One problem with a vaccine approach is that encourage overdoses, to overcome the antibodies. For nicotine, this is less of a problem, because smoking has a limited intake rate. But for cocaine, it's a real issue.
It's encouraging, though, that no side effects of this vaccine have been detected so far vs. the placebo.
The real promise for this vaccine is as a preventative measure. The average age for a new smoker is 13. Only 10% start after age 18. So if this works, a school inoculation program might be the way to prevent smoking.
From what I understand though, the immune system is locked out of the brain proper thanks to the blood brain barrier, so this drug shouldn't have any effect on naturally occurring opiates. My high school anatomy class never got into where the opiates are generated when someone has an orgasm (that would have made it far too interesting) but I'm guessing it's in the brain directly and not in the sex organs (where they would have to filter through the bloodstream before getting to the brain). Given how orgasms tend to be immediately gratifying, I'm guessing the production is local.
I read the internet for the articles.
There's no need for this. Not when a whole *class* of new drugs are coming out around nicotine anyway.
...never never never take a "vaccine" that has a life long effect for anything other then a pathogen or bent protein. For a basic neurotransmitter mimic? youve GOT to be kidding me, scares the shit out of me. End of story
Chantix got me off of ten years of smoking in two months, experientially, not just for while i was on it, but apparently *reversed* the entire psychological and physical process from those years.
Every other time i tried to quit i'd have to avoid bars and lounges so i didn't come in contact with ANY smoke at all. After chantix therapy, I don't have to avoid anything, *i just don't want to smoke*.
I'll leave it to you (i'm already aware) of exactly why chantix has such a powerful effect. Given, i would never never never..
CS majors know the time/space tradeoff, but they never get taught the 3rd, crucial, tradeoff of the set: comprehension!
This sounds similar in use, I have absolutely no clue about the pharmacology involved, to Suboxone http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suboxone and antabuse http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antabuse. This is fairly second hand knowledge, my fiancee is a drug and alcohol counselor, but I thought I'd share.
That's because there's people who would rather see people who inject drugs die than see them receive any sort of help.
Sometimes the simple act of injecting is a cry for help. Which can be very frustrating to those standing around watching shit unfold... because everyone feels helpless, and usually it has to do with an ex-significant other who is trying to get attention.
If this vaccine, and vaccines like this are available, then those that are "crying help" will have no other option than to decide to take this vaccine. They asked for the help - well we'll fucking give it to them. And then they can stop threatening to off-themselves through overdose if their ex-significant other does leave themselves. At least they can make the choice to live or die completely sober.
If I understand this correctly, this will prevent cocaine users from getting high. But how does it affect the LD50 (dosage sufficient to kill 50% of the population)?
A cocaine user decides to get high after being "immunized." He snorts a few lines. Huh. Nothing. So he snorts more and more... at some point I am willing to wager he will suffer cardiac arrest or some other life-threatening problem on his quest towards getting high. If the LD50 is not much changed, this may occur pretty easily.
Also, cocaine has a very rapid onset. I am thinking it wouldn't take much to overwhelm the slower immune system response.
This is an interesting experiment as it is always worthwhile to better understand the immune system, but I think this would be a Real Bad Idea to actually implement. Unless the objective is to kill all cocaine users.
I realize that half of what I'm about to say doesn't have much to do with what you actually wrote in your post, but your post seems like a good place to write this response, seeing as you have a somewhat skewed view on what a drug is or is not.
What do you think painkillers are? NOT drugs? Tell me, how is it that cannabis or shrooms (which grow ENTIRELY without human intervention) are considered drugs, and yet you wouldn't consider something manufacturered by a human in a laboratory to be a drug?
Pain killers are drugs. DXM is a drug. Viagra is a drug. Anti-depressents are drugs. Novacaine is a drug. Nicotine is a drug. Alcohol is a drug. Hell, even caffeine is a drug. You can't honestly sit there and be ok with something made in a lab and not call it a drug, but be against something that grows naturally, has less side effects, and call it a drug. That's just insane.
There is one thing you should realize...there is a big difference between a drug USER and a drug ABUSER. Be a user. Don't be an abuser.
Living With a Nerd
It conflicts with the business interests of a politician's donors.
Do they really think that a "vaccine" against nicotine is going to help people? If they're already addicted to nicotine for years and years, aren't they going to continue smoking and either make themselves really sick (as their immune systems attempt to fight off the nicotine) or just keep smoking away?
Some vaccines -- you take it once, you're protected forever. Others wear off eventually. I'm not sure if this is due to the illness evolving, or whether the immune system 'forgets' certain antibodies over time.
If this vaccine is permanent, expect to see it eventually being pushed into vaccination cocktails given to kids. Totally avoids the consent issue because the parents give consent, not the child. Whether this is a good idea or not, I couldn't say, but sooner or later someone at the DEA is gonna think of it.
For Tivo users, the actual names is "Hooked: Illegal Drugs and how they got that way". It is an ongoing series.
I agree with the parent, however. Very very informative about the history of our drug war.