Genetically Engineered Yeast Makes It Possible To Brew Morphine

PvtVoid writes: The New York times reports that newly developed yeast strains will soon make it possible to create morphine from fermentation of sugar. While no one has claimed to make morphine in lab from scratch yet, concerns are already being raised about potential abuse. According to the Times article: "This rapid progress in synthetic biology has set off a debate about how — and whether — to regulate it. Dr. Oye and other experts said this week in a commentary in Nature Chemical Biology that drug-regulatory authorities are ill prepared to control a process that will benefit the heroin trade much more than the prescription painkiller industry. The world should take steps to head that off, they argue, by locking up the bioengineered yeast strains and restricting access to the DNA that would let drug cartels reproduce them.

Comments

Sudafed

[jdavidb]

Forget morphine - could I just get a way to simply, legally obtain sudafed without rigamarole at the pharmacy?

Re:Sudafed

[countSudoku()]

We KNOW what your up too, Pablo Escapebar! The cops are on their way to your drug lab to confiscate your chems, inhalers, and any other paraphernalia like shaving razor replacement packs and Q-tips. The jig is UP!

Re:Sudafed

[damn_registrars]

Forget morphine - could I just get a way to simply, legally obtain sudafed without rigamarole at the pharmacy?

I recall someone posted the directions for how to make sudafed from crystal meth. Being as the latter is easier to buy than the former, you could start with that. For obvious reasons I'm not going to search for that method myself.

I don't recall if you get drain cleaner back out of it or not, though.

Re:Sudafed

[Anonymous Coward]

Pff if we could get a barrel of methalymine we could just do it biker style.

Re:Sudafed

[Anonymous Coward]

Fun fact: the word is "rigmarole," not "rigamarole."

I know nobody cares. Further evidence for this: nearly everyone gets that wrong.

Re:Sudafed

[russotto]

Pseudoephederine is already produced from yeast.

Of course, if it becomes cheaper to produce opiates from yeast than from current processes, trying to keep the yeasts secret or locked up will be futile. The stuff reproduces itself; all it takes is one well-bribed or entrepreneurial employee.

Re:Sudafed

[Holi]

Fun fact, doesn't change the fact that its spelled wrong.

Re:Sudafed

[garyisabusyguy]

Whole new angle on home-brewing and probably a heck of a lot less obvious than a field of poppies growing on your property

I thought that the development of coal-tar based opioid synthesis processes in the US was supposed to support the wholesale eradication of poppies and black market production of opium and heroin.

That obviously failed because farmers want the income, so in the EU they allow farmers to grow poppies, then purchase the entire crop in bulk for use in their pharmaceutical processes. This allows the farmers to get the income and reduces the opiates in the black market

When will the US stop deluding itself and simply purchase bulk poppies from farmers in Central and South America who simply want a source of income? This will reduce the number of people who trade in the black market and reduce the opium available for heroin production

Re:Sudafed

[ShanghaiBill]

all it takes is one well-bribed or entrepreneurial employee.

Or one employee that believes in personal freedom, and also realizes that yeast produced opiates will shut down the cartels, hurt the Taliban, reduce violence, and pretty much make the world a better place ... unless you are either a criminal or a cop.

Re:Sudafed

[geekmux]

Fun fact: English is not a dead language. Proper usage shifts over time.

Uh, proper usage? Of the word rigmarole?

You mean when we stopped calling it balderdash because it was too old-fashioned, or when we stopped calling it a clusterfuck due to the overly protective censors?

Bullshit words deserve their ongoing confusion, and belong in the Urban Dictionary and not much further.

Re:Sudafed

[Gr8Apes]

as does speling

Re:Sudafed

[flink]

Or one employee that believes in personal freedom, and also realizes that yeast produced opiates will shut down the cartels, hurt the Taliban, reduce violence, and pretty much make the world a better place ... unless you are either a criminal or a cop.

Unless, of course, the government goes on a pogrom against any large scale yeast operation, in which case only organizations with the resources to operate one illicitly will be able to benefit: the cartels and the Taliban.

Re:Sudafed

[dunkelfalke]

We had this "better world" 130ish years ago. It was not better, addicts were becoming a huge problem for the society - the actual reason drugs became illegal. And yes, there still was a war in Afghanistan.

Re:Sudafed

[bobstreo]

Or one employee that believes in personal freedom, and also realizes that yeast produced opiates will shut down the cartels, hurt the Taliban, reduce violence, and pretty much make the world a better place ... unless you are either a criminal or a cop.

Unless, of course, the government goes on a pogrom against any large scale yeast operation, in which case only organizations with the resources to operate one illicitly will be able to benefit: the cartels and the Taliban.

Oh the humanity, Budweiser and Miller breweries shut down by the feds.

Re:Sudafed

[dj245]

We had this "better world" 130ish years ago. It was not better, addicts were becoming a huge problem for the society - the actual reason drugs became illegal. And yes, there still was a war in Afghanistan.

Yes, but 130 years ago we were still in an "all hands on deck" global economy. We now have the ability to produce all the things that the world needs or wants with far less than 100% of the population. The global economy no longer needs a significant portion of the population to participate in the economy. How do you solve that? Having a class of people who do nothing but drugs all day long may actually be somewhat helpful in solving the problem of what to do with all the people that society doesn't need.

Re:Sudafed

[Anon-Admin]

Someone should read history.

Drug laws in the US are less than 100 years old. It was the late 1930's for most of them. I would suggest you read the arguments in congress while debating the law. It seems that the group FOR the law was arguing that these substances empowered the lesser races. (Im making it polite and not using the slang they used)

Drug laws in the US had more to due with racial control than they did with helping the addicts.

Just to make a point stoners are considered "lazy, irresponsible, thieves, untrustworthy, etc" All the same stereotypes used to describe blacks in the 30's, 40's, and 50's.

Re:Sudafed

[ShanghaiBill]

Unless, of course, the government goes on a pogrom against any large scale yeast operation, in which case only organizations with the resources to operate one illicitly will be able to benefit: the cartels and the Taliban.

The only "resources" needed to grow yeast are a container, a loose fitting lid, and some way to keep it warm (a bowl of warm water works well). I know this because I make my own pizza dough.

Re:Sudafed

[rockout]

It does, actually. In fact, the shifting spelling of that word has already entered the spelling that you don't like into the dictionary.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rigamarole

Definition of RIGAMAROLE: variant of rigmarole

Re:Sudafed

[FictionPimp]

Or worse, this shit becomes like wild yeast and the next time I brew beer I have to worry about creating a drink full of dope instead of just worrying a wild fermentation might just make it taste bad.

Re:Sudafed

[dunkelfalke]

It would be very short sighted too only look at the USA when it comes to history, even a relatively recent one.

Re:Sudafed

[tepples]

Oh the humanity, Budweiser and Miller breweries shut down by the feds.

It happened a century ago.

Re:Sudafed

[bytesex]

Bollocks. In China maybe. Not in the Western world. And even here, most addicts were, as usual, alcohol addicts.

Re:Sudafed

[drkoemans]

Slashdot needs to change it's subheading to be a bit more inclusive. News for nerds, pedantry, advertisements, occasionally stuff that matters... in that order.

Re:Sudafed

[Livius]

Whereas in the 19th century China had drug laws to protect.... the Chinese.

I'm confused now...

Re:Sudafed

[swb]

The Harrison Narcotics Tax Act was passed in 1914, but the impetus started closer to 1901.

While it's a common theme in anti-drug control rhetoric to blame racism for drug bans, I think the race/drug tie-in is possibly something that happened later and not a prime mover for the origin of drug controls. I think once drugs were already illegal, the laws were adjusted in ways that made them more effective tools to use against people deemed undesirable.

Personally I think the laws against drug use were probably at least as much motivated by industrialists who saw drug use as an obstacle in using low-skilled poor people in the new mass-production factories. Prior to the assembly line, I think a fair amount of industrial work was little more than scaling up the work of skilled artisans, people who probably had internalized a certain amount of self-discipline and work ethic. They were probably also drunks, too, but by virtue of their holding a skilled trade they were sort of self-selected into the group of people who could more or less hold their liquor.

Once you got the assembly line and mass production involved, the growth in industrial employment required large workforces of unskilled workers from the lower classes of society, a demographic at the time that came from cultures where alcohol use was high and who probably used drugs and alcohol more like a crude anti-depressant tonic against the fairly harsh standard of living of being poor in the late 19th century.

But you can't build an industrial empire with people who see a subsistence living under the influence as more desirable than industrial wage slavery, so better to criminalize their substance use and make work a slightly more palatable option than prison.

It was really no different for the Harrison Act -- the impetus was some Protestant religious figure appalled with opium-consuming native savages in the Philippines who knew that he wasn't going to convert them into good little Protestants if chasing the dragon and lying in the sun was an alternative.

I think a lot of the opposition to marijuana legalization really boils down to this -- a lot of moral cluckers who worry that if Johnny smokes pot, he won't be enthusiastic about going $150.000 in debt for a college degree and buying a house in the suburbs -- he'll think that it'd make much more sense to, in the words of Grandmaster Flash, "...learn to smoke reefer and be a street sweeper."

Society *needs* bodies on the treadmill to keep it going. People who use substances tend to give a lot less of a shit about the treadmill.

Re:Sudafed

[ganjadude]

fun fact, I hate fun facts

Re:Sudafed

[ganjadude]

no they werent. they make up a extremely small percentage of the overall population. the war was started for racist reasons, and business protectionism reasons simple as that

Re:Sudafed

[ganjadude]

all you have to do is read the propaganda at the time and watch the videos of the day to see that it was in fact racist at the time watch reefer madness if you dont believe me

Re:Sudafed

[bugs2squash]

again!

Re:Sudafed

[RabidReindeer]

I know nobody cares. Further evidence for this: nearly everyone gets that wrong.

Wrong? Look further down the definition.

Variants of RIGMAROLE
rigmarole also rigamarole \ri-g-m-rl, rig-m-\

Extra vowels have a way of making their way in when consonants abut.

Re:Sudafed

[meerling]

True, but for a large scale operation you are going to want to have a bioreactor for both efficiency and scale, not to mention reducing the dead giveaway large quantity of people to tend the more manual methods.
Further complication include issues with production of the new substance possibly interfering with the lifecycle of the host itself. (That's the yeast if anyone didn't get that.) And let's not forget the separation and purification of the desired product.
You do know that they use microbes to make a number of different things, such as human insulin and interferon? Just look up some of the history of those developments, and you'll get a hint of some possible difficulties. Besides, there was a market for large quantities of cheap human insulin & interferon, while the previous methods of production were horribly inefficient and could never even come close to the demand.
I'm going to hazard a guess that the criminal cartels would be opposed to this technology because it would be more expensive to the them to set up, would require workers of a higher skill & training, would cut out entire chunks of their existing structure, and would be easily capable of flooding the market and suppressing prices.
Besides, other than banning the opiate producing strain, which only takes one leak to effectively neutralize that ban, what are you going to do? Ban genetically altered strains of microbes, and tobacco? Sorry, but I'd rather shoot the asshole that tries to do that, my life depends on one of those products, and so do a LOT of other peoples. Maybe you just want to ban the research into making illegal products. That would be a little better, but still futile. Eventually it will be easy enough to do that a talented high school student will someday succeed. Additionally, if it's not banned worldwide, someone will eventually do it someplace it's not illegal, and then there is the distinct possibility that it will get loose.
Of course, there is still something people are not looking at, their strain produces morphine, a controlled, but legal, substance. Yeah, it can be turned into heroin, but so can all the legal morphine which is usually made from FLOWERS that people grow! It's used in medicine. I was once in a hospital ward and I was the only patient not receiving morphine. (The reason for that doesn't matter.) So there IS a legal trade in the product produced by that yeast, but because it can be used to make an illegal one, some people want to ban it. You know, that's not a wise path to tread upon. If something can be banned because something illegal can be made from/with it, how long until everything is banned? You know politicians, give them an inch, and they'll run you over with your own vehicle and drag you a mile down the road.

Re:Sudafed

[RabidReindeer]

New bumper sticker:

When Yeast is Outlawed, only Outlaws will bake Bread.

Don't laugh. Zero Tolerance has long arms these days.

Re: Sudafed

[guruevi]

Budweiser/Miller make beer? With yeast? I always thought they made it with water flavored with leftover hops from a real brewery.

Re:Sudafed

[rea1l1]

The US was founded as a republic, a structure designed solely to protect & defend the rights of the people.
Today, this organization is used to limit and suppress the rights of the people through intimidation and force.

Society does NOT need bodies on a treadmill unless you're using society as a massive global offensive weapon.
Most working individuals within a "modern" society DO NOT PRODUCE A PHYSICAL PRODUCT.

"We must do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living. We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because, according to Malthusian-Darwinian theory, he must justify his right to exist. So we have inspectors of inspectors and people making instruments for inspectors to inspect inspectors. The true business of people should be to go back to school and think about whatever it was they were thinking about before somebody came along and told them they had to earn a living." -- Buckminster Fuller

Re: Sudafed

[Anonymous Coward]

And the products which replaced it are useless. I notice the party of small government has yet to get the government out if that part of our lives. The whole behind the counter/mandatory ID thing is one of the most intrusive, idiotic things in the history of this country and a testament to the social, economic, and freedom disaster that is the war on drugs. End it.

As to this situation, how about we, you know, stop locking people up for wanting to briefly escape the miserable reality we force on too many and start offering proper treatment (including proper pain treatment where applicable) to those who need it? Addiction is no joke, but the crimes that go with it are largely the government's creation. They empower these drug dealers the same way they empowered gangs during prohibition. In a way they deserve each other, but we all end up paying for it.

Re:Sudafed

[Guppy]

The stuff reproduces itself; all it takes is one well-bribed or entrepreneurial employee.

Indeed. Right now, a spy or disgruntled insider might be able to smuggle out schematics of the factory. Now they can smuggle out the factory itself.

This story from 201 doesn't explicitly state there was any theft of a bio-engineered organism (involved in biotech mass-production of a chemical substrate), but I wonder if something like that might have been involved: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12...

Re: Sudafed

[HornWumpus]

Not beer, cereal malt beverages. Beer is made with Malted barley, yeast, hops and water.

There are no hops in can type American cereal malt beverages.

Re:Sudafed

[Hartree]

"He's no fun. He fell right over!"

Re:Sudafed

[itsenrique]

When cheap gin first arrived in Europe there was a lot of social decay. When Native Americans first got access to alcohol, lots of problems. In fact these problems seem to persist for generations, but eventually the population in general does not have a problem with the new hard stuff, whatever it may be. I don't advocate abuse of opiates, but the biggest problem these people have is the obscene cost to get their fix. It's not the most dangerous drug out there. It makes people act weird, and that makes us uncomfortable. Because it's not booze, or something.

Re:Sudafed

[HornWumpus]

Hard thieving irresponsible untrustworthy thieves. Lazy, they are not.

Re:Sudafed

[Hartree]

It's widely enough used that it's listed as a variant in the link the OP gave.

That said, you're spot on about teleporters.

I've been saying Kirk et al were a bunch of zombies for decades.

Re:Sudafed

[ShanghaiBill]

The US was founded as a republic, a structure designed solely to protect & defend the rights of the people.

North Korea, Cuba, and The People's Republic of China, are also republics. So was Nazi Germany, and the USSR.

Re:Sudafed

[lister king of smeg]

and the next time I brew beer I have to worry about creating a drink full of dope

You mean you accidentally brew super beer

Re: Sudafed

[amiga3D]

It's like we're incapable of learning from our mistakes and just keep repeating them over an over endlessly. How I wish people could just quit saying "they should make a law." That horrible, ignorant phrase has caused more harm than any other.

Re:Sudafed

[lister king of smeg]

Whereas in the 19th century China had drug laws to protect.... the Chinese.

I'm confused now...

Yes and the drug war in China was because British East India Company pretty much wanted make the Chinese dependent drug slaves and the Chinese government didn't want that.

Re:Sudafed

[lister king of smeg]

all you have to do is read the propaganda at the time and watch the videos of the day to see that it was in fact racist at the time watch reefer madness if you dont believe me

the propaganda is just how it was sold to the public, it does nothing to explain the motivation for it to be pushed in the first place

Re: Sudafed

[pspahn]

I'd be curious, then, to know your explanation why the US hops farmers all got screwed when AB and InBev consolidated? AB had been propping up the farmers by purchasing hops even when they didn't need them and stockpiling the reserves. InBev came in and saw a chance to save a bunch of money by using the stockpile, causing farmers to go out of business.

Re:Sudafed

[mrbester]

Fun fact: what some US dictionary states is of no interest to those from the country the word originated. And we spell it with the "extra" letter

Re:Sudafed

[DanielRavenNest]

The story is deeper than that. The Chinese liked to get paid in silver for their products (tea, porcelain, silk). Unfortunately silver is what the British money was made of (the pound sterling meant a pound of sterling silver = 92.5% pure). So it was creating a currency shortage. Britain thus wanted a product to balance trade and stop the silver outflow. Opium was that product.

The Chinese didn't want their people hooked on Opium, so they made it illegal. British trading companies that supplied the opium (it was grown in India at the time) formed a cartel to bring it in illegally, thus becoming the first drug cartel. When their people got arrested and goods seized, the British government forced China to submit in what is known as the Opium Wars. They acquired Hong Kong in the process. Later, the now legalized trading companies needed financing for the ships to deliver the expanded opium trade. So they founded the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Company. Now known as HSBC, one of the largest banks in the world, it is no stranger to laundering money for cartels, because it was*founded* by drug cartel members. To this day they print paper bank notes (currency) for Hong Kong. This makes money laundering really easy, because they can give you a suitcase of brand new money, with no traceable history.

Re:Sudafed

[ganjadude]

it was pushed to keep the rich companies known at du pont and hurst timber in business (at least the changes in the 30s were)

Re: Sudafed

[AvitarX]

I actually find the psudo sudafefvery effective, but also makes me feel funny.

Re: Sudafed

[AvitarX]

... Psudo sudafed very...

Still haven't figured out the mobile site, sorry.

Re:Sudafed

[Incadenza]

Yes, but can you sing it? (The Mekons - Brutal)

Re:Sudafed

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Better yet, with this, can I just get a yeast infection or a series of them to take care of all my drug needs, synthesized from the sugar I eat directly in my small intestine?

Re:Sudafed

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Spelling comes from wheat? Learn something new every day.

Re:Sudafed

[Maxo-Texas]

A good idea 20 years ago. Today, the farmer has a choice of death vs life due to the fully mature gang culture that has grown up around illegal drugs.

Best to just legalize it - let the gangs convert to legal families with less income.

Re:Sudafed

[fafalone]

The funny thing is, actual brand name sudafed is terrible for making meth, and good cooks avoid it like the plague. And almost never are gel tabs or products with other active ingredients use. Using anything other than generic, pseudo-only tablets with no weird fillers requires purification steps beyond the average trailer trash doing it, otherwise the result would be single-digit purity and loads of byproducts that even 99% of meth heads wouldn't buy. If it were really about controlling meth production, there'd be less restrictions on preparations rarely to never used in illicit production. Even more interesting is why they wanted to turn over production and distribution to the mexican cartels to begin with. IIRC a couple years back they seized a mexican meth lab with ***$2 billion*** worth of pure meth inside (15 tons at $150/g on the street, they claim higher tho), and there was not even a shortage afterwards.. at least I didn't read about one and would expect a victory lap if they even caused a weeklong drought.

Re:Sudafed

[ChunderDownunder]

Next Australians will be stopped at airport security for smuggling.

Security Goon: "We detected a suspicious dark slurry in your luggage"
Bloke: "Strewth mate, I'm not stupid enough to bring drugs into a country, with the tragic deaths of Chan and Sukumaran..."
SG: "The canister gave off a salty odour. We fed a sample to our narcotics canine Charlie, who is now convulsing on the floor"
Bloke: "Sorry um that's just my Vegemite. I have it on toast for breakfast"
SG: "You eat that stuff? Surely not!"
Bloke: "Honest to Warnie, I swear. Got any bread on ya?"
SG: "(sniffs and dry retches) No one could stomach that!"
Security Goon 2: "Chemical analysis reveals a high concentration of morphine. Lock him up for ten years"

Re: Sudafed

[Anonymous Coward]

I notice the party of small government has yet to get the government out if that part of our lives.

Probably because this mythical party doesn't exist.

Re:Sudafed

[ganjadude]

ive written papers on the subject, I know what im talking about. the post above as you pointed out had to do with one substance. opium was used against asians in the early days as well.

Re:Sudafed

[swb]

Laws against drug use are used as a means of control and intimidation by providing the police with a tool to suspect, stop and search people, usually the underclass. It's mostly a coincidence that the underclass is predominantly minority and it certainly enables further intimidation and control of minorities to be sure.

But I think a big reason marijuana remains illegal is not because of any specific risk from marijuana use itself, but because marijuana use is so widespread it provides the police with near limitless justification, opportunity and motivation to suspect and search people. If you legalized marijuana you move the decimal point several places to the left on the chances someone you randomly stop may actually be a person of legitimae interest. You also lose the influence you had over people who use marijuana.

Bottom line is legalization means the cops lose a major rationale to treat most people like criminal suspects. It makes it harder to run roughshod over minorities, too, but I think the general power and control outweighs its specific utility against minorities.

Re:Sudafed

[ultranova]

True, but for a large scale operation you are going to want to have a bioreactor for both efficiency and scale, not to mention reducing the dead giveaway large quantity of people to tend the more manual methods.

No, you don't.

Re: Sudafed

[djdarko]

Fun fact: "wrong" is an adjective. The usual grammatically-correct way to put it is "it was spelled incorrectly."

Re:Sudafed

[tsotha]

That's what I was thinking. This is definitely one of those genie in the bottle stuffing exercises that's never going to work. Drug cartels have more money than God - either they'll hire their own scientists to reverse engineer the yeast strain, or someone will slip it to them for a suitcase full of cash.

Re:Sudafed

[Ramze]

Fun fact, words can have more than one spelling, and rigamarole is a perfectly acceptable spelling:

http://www.merriam-webster.com...

Also, it's a bit stupid to declare "rigmarole" as the proper spelling over "rigamarole" when the term itself is a colloquial bastardization of "ragman roll."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R...

Re:Sudafed

[Khyber]

Which is bullshit, because by definition a word cannot have itself in the definition for it to be a usable definition.

So who the fuck changed that rule?

Re:Sudafed

[Khyber]

"True, but for a large scale operation you are going to want to have a bioreactor for both efficiency and scale, not to mention reducing the dead giveaway large quantity of people to tend the more manual methods."

No, all you need is a carboy and an airlock. Could bury that shit in the ground and make it nearly undetectable minus the emissions of CO2. Which, if you're smart, you'd plant a crop around that and take advantage of the naturally higher localized CO2 levels for a better crop, while you're at it. Weed up top, opiates underground. Two birds with one stone. Thick cannabis canopy would hide those airlocks peeping up out of the ground pretty easily. A setup like this could be quickly accomplished in states legalized/medical cannabis laws.

Re:Sudafed

[Khyber]

Actually it would probably be considered closer to laudanum than beer.

Re:Sudafed

[Khyber]

No more need for poppy seed bagels to cause false positives on urinalysis tests! I can just literally boil and bake opium bagels!

Re:Sudafed

[Dog-Cow]

Of course there was no shortage. You don't think there's 15 tons of meth in an evidence locker somewhere, do you?

Re:Sudafed

[advocate_one]

When will the US stop deluding itself and simply purchase bulk poppies from farmers in Central and South America who simply want a source of income? This will reduce the number of people who trade in the black market and reduce the opium available for heroin production

Because then the CIA would have no source of 'black' income and means to bribe officials/governments with...

Re:Sudafed

[dave420]

A republic merely means a country without a dynastic leader. That's it. It has absolutely nothing to do with democracy or "protect[ing] & defend[ing] the rights of the people". Why is it nearly everyone who starts an argument by describing a republic gets it wrong? Is your education really that bad??

Re:Sudafed

[rockout]

You should probably read up on the differences between description and prescription.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:Sudafed

[drewlake2000]

They beat Ireland and Scotland in the World Cup (Cricket that is, not football)

Re:Sudafed

[StikyPad]

I don't know about all that, but regardless, 100 years ago we made the mistake of believing that banning drugs would make them unavailable, and/or stop people from using them because laws are somehow more compelling than addiction. We wanted, as always, an easy solution to a complex problem.

At the same time, we didn't need to ban cigarettes to decrease usage, so clearly addictive and harmful products can be discouraged without the need to make them illegal.

Re: Sudafed

[HornWumpus]

Hops go stale. Perhaps AB needed a tiny amount of stale, tasteless hops to make their piss water.

Just maybe InBevs products (e.g. Stella) need an equally tiny amount of fresh hops.

I just don't think AB used all that many hops to begin with. You can wave a single hop above a giant kettle of Buttweiser and it's fully hopped. Kind of like most Kona blend coffee.

Re:Sudafed

[Hartree]

I still use both balderdash and clusterfuck. Guess I'm just too old fashioned.

Re: Sudafed

[K10W]

And the products which replaced it are useless. I notice the party of small government has yet to get the government out if that part of our lives. The whole behind the counter/mandatory ID thing is one of the most intrusive, idiotic things in the history of this country and a testament to the social, economic, and freedom disaster that is the war on drugs. End it.

As to this situation, how about we, you know, stop locking people up for wanting to briefly escape the miserable reality we force on too many and start offering proper treatment (including proper pain treatment where applicable) to those who need it? Addiction is no joke, but the crimes that go with it are largely the government's creation. They empower these drug dealers the same way they empowered gangs during prohibition. In a way they deserve each other, but we all end up paying for it.

aye the replacement (mainly phenyl eph) MAY work but not in the dosages that have been tested as safe. I tend to just buy ephedrine these days (in POM OTC asthma drugs in UK like chesteze) because I can just flash an inhaler if I get 20 questions where as blocked sinuses etc didn't seem to stop the 20 question BS here when buying pseudo in UK. Despite no ID needed etc not very intelligent pharmacy staff tend to get a little ott like you're asking to buy Methedrine pills ffs.

Funny thing is hardly any meth would be made from the pills since the price is extortionate and when you consider amount needed, yields (chemistry wise I mean) and all the waste in decanting/filtering etc it would be hundreds of times more expensive before any markup. Most street meth across the globe is either diverted legit supplies or illicit made by crew from bulk precursors (various amphetamines and phenethylamines) bought it MASSIVE amounts. The kind of amounts that get LE knocking or rival crews coming to tax or hurt you because the amount wont go unnoticed. Only time homebrew is worth it is during droughts, similar to the desomorphine homebrew in Australia and later Russia (when it got krokodil name) because users couldn't get heroin. Russian thing is probably due to cost rather than true drought as a lot of global heroin moves that way from Afghanistan green zone.

Re: Sudafed

[hawkfish]

... Psudo sudafed very...

Still haven't figured out the mobile site, sorry.

It was funnier the first time!

Re:Sudafed

[Agripa]

unless you are either a criminal or a cop.

But you repeat yourself.

Re:Sudafed

[jwhitener]

While it's a common theme in anti-drug control rhetoric to blame racism for drug bans, I think the race/drug tie-in is possibly something that happened later and not a prime mover for the origin of drug controls.

There may have been alternative motives, but the main ones expressed by the creators of the Act you reference were very explicit:

The drafters played on fears of “drug-crazed, sex-mad negroes” and made references to Negroes under the influence of drugs murdering whites, degenerate Mexicans smoking marijuana, and “Chinamen” seducing white women with drugs.[16][17] Dr. Hamilton Wright, testified at a hearing for the Harrison Act. Wright alleged that drugs made blacks uncontrollable, gave them superhuman powers and caused them to rebel against white authority. Dr. Christopher Koch of the State Pharmacy Board of Pennsylvania testified that "Most of the attacks upon the white women of the South are the direct result of a cocaine-crazed Negro brain".[4]

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Narcotics_Tax_Act

Re: Sudafed

[RockDoctor]

tasteless hops to make their piss water.

"their diabetic horse's piss", please. Go the whole hog on the (entirely justified) insult.

(The version I'm thinking of is $BIG_MERKIN_BREWERY$ sends crate of it's best product to Czech brewery $BIG_CZ_BRAUERIE$. Some weeks later a reply is recieved at $BIG_MERKIN_BREWERY$, which is opened with excitement : "Dear Sirs. We regret to inform you that your horse has diabetes.")

Re: Sudafed

[Occams]

Bumgravy! Recreational drug use never improved the life of anyone.

Taliban tally...

[harvey the nerd]

...in other news, so many Taliban are going to divorce their 3rd and 4th wives due to low opium sales.

Re:Taliban tally...

[plopez]

Just like in the US. Swap out the old wife for the young one.

Major changes in many countries

[amorsen]

If we eliminated the need to grow opium, a some countries would find their economies transformed. Imagine Afghanistan without opium financing various criminal factions. We just need to figure out how to make cocaine without coca, and Middle America would be changed too.

Of course that relies on the secret getting out. Otherwise we are still stuck with the morass of violent crime.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[amorsen]

There has been practically zero progress on handling the demand side. Doing so would require a radical rethink of how Western countries deal with drugs and drug addiction. This is not likely to happen in the next 20 years at least, and it is stupid to condemn other countries to 20 more years of violence by keeping our focus on limiting supply.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[garyisabusyguy]

Unfortunately, the one effective treatment for opioid addiction is Ibogaine, and medical study or application of it in America is illegal because it is a schedule 1 drug

Yippee for 'Merica shooting itself in the foot for over 200 years

Re:Major changes in many countries

[ShanghaiBill]

oh, I dunno...figuring out how to not ensure demand stays at 100%.

An obvious first step is to start treating addiction as a medical problem rather than as a criminal problem. Maybe we should spend less on police and prison guards, and more on doctors and nurses.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[garyisabusyguy]

We already did eliminate the need to grow opium and all opioids used in American pharmaceuticals come from a coal-tar process.

This was supposed to bring about the end of illegal opium and heroin, but has not had the effect because it is very hard to get people to stop growing a plant that they can get paid lots of money for.

Countries like Hungary allow farmers to grow a limited amount of poppies, which are purchased for use in the European pharma industry. This allows the farmers to make money and keeps it from becoming heroin

There is no reason to believe that creating new ways to synthesize opioids will reduce the growing of poppies

Re:Major changes in many countries

[Anonymous Coward]

I imagine you are pretty young. I'll let you in on a little secret, constantly talking to people like they are idiots isn't going to bring anyone around to your way of thinking.

As an aside, your way of thinking in this particular case is pretty extreme and not really borne out by reality. It turns out that there are all kinds of drugs that are currently illegal that people continue to use regularly without dying. Heck, there are completely legal substances and activities that can kill you if not handled with moderation. I'm sure you know all of that.

Now, if you were instead trying to get people to consider that treatment of addiction is important, then you should probably suggest that more directly and without all the hyperbole, and you may find that you are among many like minded individuals.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[Mr D from 63]

It is not a crime to be addicted.

How about we work on prevention as well.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[dj245]

There has been practically zero progress on handling the demand side. Doing so would require a radical rethink of how Western countries deal with drugs and drug addiction. This is not likely to happen in the next 20 years at least, and it is stupid to condemn other countries to 20 more years of violence by keeping our focus on limiting supply.

In Canada (at least in Sydney, Nova Scotia), addicts get their fix right at the hospital. For free.

It seems stupid at first, but it is extremely effective in reducing all kinds of crime related to drugs and addiction. Nobody there is breaking into houses or summer cabins looking for painkillers or goods to pawn. Nobody is stealing car stereos and pawning them to finance their habit. The number of people mixing dangerous chemicals in their house or garage is reduced. Why bother with all that when you just go to the hospital and get your legal high for free? Product originating from Taliban-controlled areas can't compete with free.

If Marijuana is more your style, they have medical marijuana laws and lax enforcement of recreational use. The end result is that local people grow it in their basements, cutting out any foreign supplier or middlemen. Marijuana isn't free, but I have yet to hear of any case where someone broke the law in order to get money to buy weed.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[garyisabusyguy]

You are playing word games

An addict can either pay for heroin, or pay for a substitute like methadone (assuming that they want to get off of heroin)

If they decide to use heroin for their addiction, then they are criminals because there is no legal way to get heroin in America.
This is very expensive and in many cases requires that they either steal from others, or sell heroin themselves. These are both criminal activities

We have a lot of 'prevention' activities going on right now. They seem to be ineffective. One big problem with them is that they have created a large blackmarket infrastructure that is particularly good at finding and supplying new customers.

Portugal has decriminalized all drugs and as a result reduced the number of new users, which is to say that decriminalization is the path to prevention

Try selling that idea in America

Re:Major changes in many countries

[sound vision]

You are incorrect about the origin of prescription opiates in the US. A small portion of opiates prescribed are fully synthetic: methadone, pethidine, fentanyl are the only relevant ones. By volume of prescriptions as well as sheer number of products, opiates synthesized from poppy constituents (if not extracted directly from poppy) are way more: codeine, morphine, hydrocodone, oxycodone, hydromorphone, oxymorphone, ...

Re:Major changes in many countries

[garyisabusyguy]

Possession of heroin is a felony

The theory is that having a felony for possession allows the police to pressure the defendant into turning over their supplier

The theory goes onto suggest that they can use this technique to gain knowledge of and arrest the kingpins of the drug syndicate

This has not been demonstrated in reality where most of the people serving time for drug possession are wither users or low level stooges used to transport the products

Re:Major changes in many countries

[geekmux]

oh, I dunno...figuring out how to not ensure demand stays at 100%.

An obvious first step is to start treating addiction as a medical problem rather than as a criminal problem. Maybe we should spend less on police and prison guards, and more on doctors and nurses.

Alcoholism was officially defined as a disease over half a century ago, paving the way for treatment centers to open all across the country with full official support and backing from the medical and insurance community.

What was the direct impact on alcoholism today? By the time you finish reading this sentence, three more humans will become addicted to alcohol.

Treating addiction as a medical problem? Oh yeah. I can really tell how well that fucking tactic worked out...

Re:Major changes in many countries

[garyisabusyguy]

Codeine and Morphine are both synthesized in the US by processes patented in the 1950's and promoted in the US in the 1970's

"President's Nixon's War on Drugs made it increasingly difficult to obtain these poppies that grow mostly in areas of the world that are unfriendly to America's pharmaceutical interest, such as Afghanistan. Drug manufacturers have had to barter with heroin dealers for the purchase of this raw codeine product. This led chemist to the discovery of a method to synthesize codeine from coal tar, which eliminated the need for having the original black-tar opium and freed the drug companies from having to compete with the illicit drug cartels. "
http://www.narconon.org/drug-i...

In the US the official doctrine is to suppress the growing of poppies for opiate production:

"The United States, however, has no present intention of entering the field of poppy cultivation. On the contrary, this field was abandoned as a matter of national policy, and commercial poppy cultivation suppressed even during the war: for it is the conviction of the narcotics authorities of the United States that only by striking at the source can the opium evil finally be overcome. It may be that in some countries the poppy can be grown for seed alone, or for seed and alkaloids, without the danger of narcotic addiction spreading among the population. Certain it is, however, that, in some countries, opium is produced far in excess of legitimate needs. It is the belief of the United States that the only way to conquer the opium evil is by restricting, and, where necessary, completely abolishing, the cultivation of the opium poppy plant itself. The narcotics authorities of the United States have expressed their satisfaction that the United States can contribute, by its own sacrifice and example, to this end"
http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/...

Re:Major changes in many countries

[MachineShedFred]

Horseshit.

There are two charges when it comes to narcotics:

Possession
Possession with intent to distribute

The difference between them is basically the seized quantity of the illicit substance. Both are prosecuted. Often.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[ninjagin]

I'd prefer that we just let the Afghans sell their poppy-scrapings to drug companies and keep it above-board.
Just my $.02.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[ninjagin]

Here in Colorado, there's a bunch of crime centered around grow facilities (robbing them) and robberies and burglaries for the cash being transported. It's one of the main reasons why the state is lobbying very hard for banking regulation reform at the fed level, for example.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[rea1l1]

That was intentional. The people were never supposed to get comfortable. That would result in individual creativity, personal independence, and thus a loss in profits & control.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[Anonymice]

Opium may be produced by some criminal groups, but the overall majority is produced by poor farmers who have no other choice. The Americans went in all heroic & destroyed many of their crops, without giving them any other viable alternative to make a living. You want them to grow something else? Okay, create a demand for it.

It's the same for coca, in fact coca is a traditional crop that's nationally consumed in Bolivia as both a tea & chewing herb. The majority of cocaine is produced from illegal, unlicensed plantations.

I actually find it quite tragically humorous that the very nation that created this narcotics black market & has so heavily bullied other countries to fight its "War on Drugs", is now going through the process of liberalising & legalising the production of its own drugs. The hypocrisy after all the damage they've caused is startling.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[Mr D from 63]

I did not say it was not a crime.

Users only are generally not prosecuted.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[Mr D from 63]

Charges are different than prosecution and putting people in jail.

The first one rarely. The second one much more often.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[inflamed]

Could you provide a reference that's not narconon (a division of scientology)?

Re:Major changes in many countries

[garyisabusyguy]

Mr D seems to be expressing the 'soft side' claims of prohibitionists that there are no 'drug users' only 'drug dealers' in jail

This is an attempt to negate the 'less harm' argument that the most harmful thing that can happen to most drug users to being arrested, receiving a felony and going to jail, which places a life-long stigma on them and their ability to earn a living

Unfortunately, Mr D is wrong and prosecutors across the country make use of stiff felony convictions for drug users, frequently placing naive offenders into prison with violent convicts who only deepen the antisocial practices of the drug users

Re:Major changes in many countries

[garyisabusyguy]

Reference to coal-tar base synthesis of Morphine
"It was announced in 1973 that a team at the National Institutes of Health in the United States had developed a method for total synthesis of morphine, codeine, and thebaine using coal tar as a starting material. A shortage in codeine-hydrocodone class cough suppressants (all of which can be made from morphine in one or more steps, as well as from codeine or thebaine) was the initial reason for the research."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M...

However, on further research these steps may have been abandoned or subsidized with 'less expensive' means by importing Narcotic Raw Materials (NRM) from seven allowed countries, since NRMs may not be produced in America. The allowed countries are:
"Traditional suppliers India and Turkey must be the source of at least 80 percent of the United States' requirement for NRM. Five non- traditional supplier countries--France, Poland, Hungary, Australia, and Yugoslavia--may be the source of not more than 20 percent. "
http://www.deadiversion.usdoj....

Re:Major changes in many countries

[tsotha]

Do you think these places will actually be better off? Seems hard to believe. A big cash infusion like that isn't going to get spend only on guns. Those guys are buying things from legitimate businessmen.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[geekmux]

Your number is meaningless without knowing the rates of of alcoholism and alcohol-related mortality over time.

Just in the United States, someone becomes addicted to alcohol at the rate of one every three seconds.

http://www.substance.com/live-drug-stats-visualizing-drug-use-in-america/13180/

According to the CDC not long ago, alcohol was the 3rd leading cause of preventable death. Not sure what more we need to talk about. This problem isn't getting better or going away. We've just managed to waste billions making it acceptable to insurance companies for the last few decades by trying to reclassify it as a disease.

Re:Major changes in many countries

[Whorhay]

"The difference between them is basically the seized quantity of the illicit substance. Both are prosecuted. Often."

In some jurisdiction quantity isn't a factor if it's a second arrest for the same charge. For instance in my state a second arrest for possesion of marijuana, regardless of quantity is automatically elevated to "with intent to distribute".

Yeah good luck with that!

[Anonymous Coward]

I think its inevitable that the drug cartels will find a way to get this. The answer to the drug problem is legalisation and regulation, treat addiction as the disease it is!

Re:Yeah good luck with that!

[ShanghaiBill]

I think its inevitable that the drug cartels will find a way to get this.

When this gets out, the cartels will be out of business. No one has a greater interest in keeping these yeast locked up.

The answer to the drug problem is legalisation and regulation

That would also put the cartels out of business.

Re:Yeah good luck with that!

[garyisabusyguy]

Interesting...

Drug cartels make money because drugs are illegal

Therefore, politicians that work to keep drugs illegal are enabling drug cartels to make money

Would it be going too far to wonder if the drug cartels would bother to support the election of politicians who work to keep drugs illegal?

Re:Yeah good luck with that!

[Khashishi]

If, by drug cartels, you mean Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and Novartis, then yes, they will find a way to get this.

Re:Yeah good luck with that!

[Frobnicator]

Drug cartels make money because drugs are illegal

No, drugs are regulated.

After a whole bunch of deaths, addictions, permanent damage, and otherwise destroyed lives, laws regulating medicine were established to help protect people both from scammers and also from their own ignorance. Back in the late 1800's morphine was available to anyone and was widely abused, then in 1895 Bayer launched heroin as a less addictive substitute sold directly to the public, only to have it lead to even more drug abuse problems. Drug stores were not regulated and would frequently swap out relatively expensive drugs with other compounds. Many drugs were sold as tinctures, which the store could heavily dilute with alcohol.

Too many "snake oil salesmen", too many drug abuses, too many fake drugs, too many overdoses, and over time people demanded rules and regulations.

Today there are regulations in most nations.

Chemicals that had a significant reaction are regulated, not illegal. In the US that means five different classifications of drugs, from Schedule 1 (no accepted clinical use, limited research use only), through Schedule 5 over-the-counter (readily available preparations including OTC drugs). Potentially dangerous or addictive preparations require a physician's direction. Drug stores are required to meet strict standards to ensure the exact prescribed medicine is given out rather than diluted or fake products. That is a GOOD THING. That is how you know your heart medication or allergy pill is not a sugar pill, or insulin wasn't replaced with saline, or your child's antibiotic for pneumonia wasn't swapped out with bubblegum flavored liquor.

In this case of morphine-producing yeast, that would fall under a Schedule 2 product, same as morphine, and require the same oversight to help reduce abuse and misuse of the highly addictive compounds.

Re:Yeah good luck with that!

[rea1l1]

Here we have an effect of the supposedly republican government overstepping its bounds and pretending to be a democracy, resulting in the disrespect of the rights of the people. My rights end where yours begin.

We now have people telling other people what they can and cannot do with their own property; their own bodies, their own compounds, their own free agency.

What happened to liberty, freedom, and responsibility? Profit. Nearly every single one of our mainstream industries have been monopolized by social industrial groups as if we were living in a democracy, & not a republic, as was founded.

Who cares that the constitution is entirely ignored by everyone in the field of law? You should. Modern law is unlawful in its entirety.

The tenth amendment clearly states:

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Today, everything is under the rule of the plutocracy of the Forcefully United States Corporation.

Re:Yeah good luck with that!

[dave420]

You don't know what "republic" and "democracy" mean, yet insist on using them ad nauseam. Please stop. It's embarrassing.

Reshape prohibition

[edtice1559]

Hopefully this reshapes our modern prohibition. Whether or not laws change, this stuff will now be manufactured in small facilities. No need to control large swaths of land. The opium farmers will go from terrorized to abandoned. Don't know whether that will be good for them or not. No more smuggling loads around the world. Just import some bacteria and start producing. Should increase competition in the market, too, and drive the price down. Less lucrative to control the inner city distribution points so those areas will go from terrorized to abandoned too. Should be interesting to see this unfold. I hope for the best.

Re: Reshape prohibition

[ArmoredDragon]

Or the US government could suddenly declare that genetic engineering is subject to DEA oversight, subjecting that particular field to a dark age.

Which given the US government's stupidly overzealous substance control laws, it's not far removed from being a reality.

Re:Reshape prohibition

[beep54]

Capitalism at its finest, then.

Re: Reshape prohibition

[edtice1559]

The US government may do as you describe. But I don't think it will matter to the drug traffickers or users! They will go about as if the restriction didn't exist.

Re: Reshape prohibition

[Dunbal]

Who gives @#$*( if people start brewing narcotics at home.

The same people who take the time to airbrush and blur out a boob on a Picasso, that's who. The best part is this kind of person thinks it is doing the world a favor.

Re: Reshape prohibition

[plopez]

The health care industry was unregulated until about the 20's. So many people died that the FDA and a host of health and sanitation laws were pass. Then the death rate started to drop.

People forget that for a long time going to a hospital actually increased your odds of dying.

Re: Reshape prohibition

[HornWumpus]

Most people still die in hospitals. Avoid them if you can.

Re:Reshape prohibition

[Anonymous Coward]

some bacteria

Pet peeve: Yeasts are not bacteria, they are fungi.

Re:Reshape prohibition

[hey!]

Hopefully this reshapes our modern prohibition.

This kind of presumes reason is the basis of our drug laws.

Re: Reshape prohibition

[ArmoredDragon]

The same people who take the time to airbrush and blur out a boob [jezebel.com] on a Picasso, that's who. The best part is this kind of person thinks it is doing the world a favor.

Actually I think they probably had a good reason to do that. Remember how much of a shitstorm the 2004 superbowl halftime caused? The FCC made a lot of money that day by fining the shit out of everybody involved.

And I like how the website you linked just jumps on Fox News and conservatives, even though this action likely has nothing to do with either of them (Fox affiliates are independently owned.)

Re: Reshape prohibition

[ArmoredDragon]

Dude, pay the fuck attention to what he said, he was specifically calling blame for the people who airbrushed it out. You can't blame somebody for not wanting to get fined to last Tuesday and/or having their broadcast license (which is their sole means of employment) revoked over a titty.

Ever since 2004, there's been a heavy sense of "if in doubt, blur it out" in the entire broadcast industry, and it's not their fault at all.

Yeah, good luck with that

[damn_registrars]

The world should take steps to head that off, they argue, by locking up the bioengineered yeast strains and restricting access to the DNA that would let drug cartels reproduce them

How would they restrict them to something that someone with enough money couldn't buy their way around? Being as the drug cartels have no shortage of money, it seems like a pointless move.

Re:Yeah, good luck with that

[Jeremi]

How would they restrict them to something that someone with enough money couldn't buy their way around?

Now that it's known to be possible, the drug cartels don't even need to buy or steal the recipe. If necessary, they could just hire some genetic engineers to independently re-discover how to do it.

They can't stop tons of heroin

[Anonymous Coward]

But they can prevent even a few spores from getting into the hands of the cartels.
Truthfully it would be the cartels who would fight a desperate drug war to keep this production democratizing yeast out of the hands of home brew street dealers and junkies killing off their trillion dollar middleman industry and their other side of the drug war profits with it.
This is dangerous as it would take all of the violence and money form the heroin trade.

Fan-tastic!

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Now buying homebrewing gear will join buying hydroponic gardening equipment on the list of 'completely legal things most likely to cause the DEA to batter down your door and shoot your dog.'

That'll be fun.

Re:Fan-tastic!

[Dunbal]

And get away with it scot-free, that's the absolute best part.

Here you go....

[Ellis D. Tripp]

heterodoxy.cc/meowdocs/pseudo/pseudosynth.pdf

Re:Here you go....

[jfengel]

That's a riot. Thanks for that.

Re:Here you go....

[NormalVisual]

That's hysterical. Along those same lines, a co-worker met Bryan Cranston this past weekend.

How?

[grasshoppa]

I'm not sure how they hope to contain such a yeast strain. Sure, they can lock it up *now*, but for how long will that last? It'll only take a single corrupt employee, or group of employees, being offered more money than they could ever hope to make in several lifetimes. Then it's out in the wild. Unless they plan on building in some kind of critical vulnerability in the strain, any home brewer can replicate the yeast with ease. Even if they do build in a critical vulnerability, it'll be an "addon" and thus, possible to disable.

I foresee another "War on Drugs" coming, where the objective in unobtainable. Fortunately after the first round of funding, the objective becomes irrelevant ( of course, the cynic in me is YELLING that the objective IS the funding..but I digress ).

Re:How?

[hankwang]

"any home brewer can replicate the yeast with ease." I wouldn't be so sure of that. If this yeast is slow to replicate compared to wild yeast strains that float around in the air, it may be quite difficult to keep your strain from getting outcompeted by other strains unless you have a cleanroom facility at home.

Re:Sweet...Breaking Bad reboot storyline in 2025

[dmbasso]

No, no, no! This time it will be Pasteur!

Sometimes the banhammer is the wrong tool

[Anonymous Coward]

Decriminalise drugs and there's suddenly no reason to deal with criminals to get your preferred recreational pharmaceutical. This ought to drop prices and even reduce related crime like thefts to fund the habit. Then this whole yeast thing is not a problem either. Not that I particularly care about this, as even with legal drugs gratis for all I'd still refrain.

But the discussion is focusing on the wrong thing. The problem is criminality around drugs, where you could have safe legal supplies and high quality help on hand instead. That would be a much better proposition than hitting rock bottom before getting shipped off to rehab, or jails full of addicts with really poor --but always some-- supply and inevitably such niceties as very poor needle hiegiene. Most of the problems of drug abuse are the result of poorly thought-out countermeasures, not of the abuse itself. Scientists ought to be smart enough to recognise this and debate that instead.

Imagine auto-brewery syndrome with this...

[Rhacman]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A...

"Auto-brewery syndrome, also known as gut fermentation syndrome, is a rare medical condition in which intoxicating quantities of ethanol are produced through endogenous fermentation within the digestive system."

Now imagine this with a yeast that produces morphine...

Re:Imagine auto-brewery syndrome with this...

[slew]

Now imagine this with a yeast that produces morphine...

Or just a standard yeast infection...

Re:Imagine auto-brewery syndrome with this...

[Cmdr-Absurd]

I was thinking the same thing: Star Trek TOS "The Naked Time." IRL.

Re:Imagine auto-brewery syndrome with this...

[ihtoit]

where do I get some o'that?

Re:This will make the Republicans so happy,s...

[ChrisMaple]

Yes, I'm sure the Crips and Bloods, and the south of the border cartels, are just full of Republicans.

Why fight it?

[bistromath007]

Let's just make opiates the opiate of the masses. They're way more effective than what we've been using instead.

Re:Why fight it?

[spauldo]

Religion is the traditional opiate of the masses, and has better lobbyists.

Destroy the cartels

[ChrisMaple]

Easy home brewing of mind-degrading drugs is the drug cartels' worst nightmare. Cartels disappear almost overnight as US citizens can brew drugs at far below the cartel cost of production.

Re: Destroy the cartels

[BeaverCleaver]

It hasn't happened with alcohol. Very easy to make at home using yeast, yet people still buy alcoholic drinks.

Re: Destroy the cartels

[ihtoit]

I haven't since I built my own still.

Now my seeing dog has to hit the valves.

Just wait for it...

[newcastlejon]

The genome will be on pastebin faster than you can say "DeCSS".

A lot of people would worry:

[Hartree]

If it works out and is economical compared to the old methods (and that's a heck of a big "if"):

There are a lot of illegal opium poppy growing operations that would have to drop their prices, use other means (killing those running brewing operations) or go out of business.

I can't say I'll shed many tears for some of the leaders of those groups.

What can you do about it?

[MikeRT]

At this point, anyone who uses hard drugs in the US is doing so after years of being told all of the nasty things they do to your body. There's no curing that level of stupid. There's a percentage of the population that in the absence of morphine, will abuse bath salts and model glue. No law can fix that complete lack of long term thinking.

Re:What can you do about it?

[Khashishi]

A lot of people who abuse drugs do so because their lives suck. Maybe they don't care about their long term health because they have no hope for the future and don't care if it kills them. Efforts to penalize them for using drugs simply makes their lives suck more and their future even more hopeless.

Re:What can you do about it?

[tsotha]

From what I can tell, rehab does jack shit. People who want to get clean get clean. The others don't. The best we can do is give them pharmaceutical quality methadone so they don't die before they decide to get clean.

Re:What can you do about it?

[bobbied]

Yea, so? It doesn't mean we shouldn't at least try to help because you never know if that addict really is at the end of themselves and ready to get clean, or just saying what they have to in order to stay out of jail. Going clean should ALWAYS be an option, and staying clean should be the requirement to stay out of jail, but we should offer to help anyone who is willing to do rehab... (We being the government.. Personally, a whole lot of addicts are enabled by their loved ones to remain addicts and that should stop... But government should never give up trying.)

Finally, an end to the War on Drugs

[penguinoid]

There's already a drug with many harmful effects that is widely abused, that was legally (as in, the Constitution was modified) banned, and is made by yeast.

Re:Finally, an end to the War on Drugs

[ihtoit]

ethanol.

All your genes are belong to us!

[pla]

and restricting access to the DNA that would let drug cartels reproduce them

One problem there - Humans contain the DNA for producing morphine. It works so well precisely because out body already uses it to regulate our natural pain response.

Re:All your genes are belong to us!

[ihtoit]

we produce opioid peptides (endorphines) in our liver, which bind to opioid receptors. Morphine is simply very pure endorphine. On speed. Out of a needle. Other natural sources for opioid peptides include gluten in cereals, mammalian casein, soybean, and spinach. The gene for human endorphine was isolated and sequenced in 1982. (Sources: MeSH/VAST local databases)

Re:All your genes are belong to us!

[etinin]

Well, not correct. Endogenous opiates include endorphins, enkephalins, dynorphins and, surprisingly morphine itself (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10941194).

Morphine has particularly bad side effects when taken orally. But no endogenous opiate release can ever match the dopamine release of even small opioid intake. Anyone who's ever taken (pharmceutical) opioids for any reason surely understands why one gets addicted to those. Having happiness anxiety-be-gone pills in your pocket can be tempting.

And what's even worse: unlike true depressants, up to a certain threshold there is almost no effect whatsoever on cognitive performance and will not make you sleepy. So when used in a certain way people get happy and work (and even find work interesting). It is said that chinese immigrants making use of opioids to work better in factories resulted in prejudice which led to opioids being banned in the United States.

Re:All your genes are belong to us!

[ihtoit]

please send your corrections to MeSH/VAST. Wait, strike that, nothing you said except the first three words actually contradicted any of the information I gave.

The fuck was the point of that, then?

Re:Yeast Banned

[bobbied]

How do you stop people from making sour dough? Yeast is literally everywhere...

Yet another attempt...

[cynicist]

to deal with symptoms instead of causes. The drug cartel is only so powerful and dangerous because the laws banning these drugs make it extremely lucrative to trade them. Although... legalizing would be easier said than done, given that you would make a number of law enforcement personnel entirely redundant if you could achieve it, not to mention piss off many misguided people who still think they can impose control of these things through law. When will they see that their short-sighted views are responsible for this monster? Probably never.

Re:WoY begins!

[slew]

Also, it takes a good guy with a yeast to stop a bad guy with a yeast.

As any baker will tell you, it often only takes a little bit of bad yeast to stop the good yeast...

Re:the inevitable

[Dunbal]

Yeah we already have so much trouble with good old alcohol producing yeast escaping into the wild and getting unsuspecting people drunk.

Politicians...

[eth1]

Given the amount of sense I've come to expect from regulators, I'm sure sugar is about to become a controlled substance...

Surprised it has taken this long

[Gilgaron]

I'm honestly surprised it has taken this long for drugs to be made this way. Well, not that many aren't already, but ones that the average person would be interested in making, that is... really anything that isn't toxic to yeast ought to be doable.

Re:the inevitable

[BronsCon]

Except that alcohol bakes out of the bread while morphine does not.

Re:the inevitable

[MobSwatter]

Forget 1920's Coke... BEER! - now with morphine...

If there is a will, there is a way.... -to make people stupid.

Re:This will make the Republicans so happy,s...

[garyisabusyguy]

You betcha, just ask Freeway Ricky Ross...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%...

about the conduit that he was apart of between Central America and the mean streets of LA as part of the Iran Contra fiasco
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...

Fascinating

Re:This will make the Republicans so happy,s...

[plopez]

Do a little reading on Iran-Contra and the role drug money played. See also how the same approach was used to fund an illegal war in Laos by the CIA, Panama, Mexico and a host of others.

Here's a starting point:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A...

Re:the inevitable

[Dunbal]

Don't worry morphine is not temperature stable and will break down at bread-baking temperatures. But seriously, don't make bread with it. If you're worried about contamination of regular yeast, however, then remember only a really really small part of your yeast will not be wild-type. Unless you went out of your way to select for the genetically engineered yeast in your sample, you're getting plain old yeast (with maybe a trace of genetically engineered yeast after many years of this strain being commonly available). There's no reason to think that fermenting to morphine provides any evolutionary benefit to yeast versus fermenting to ethanol. So you won't be overdosing on opioid bread just yet.

"Restricting Access to DNA" R.O.F.L.

[burni2]

You want yeast DNA?

Lick your hand.
Lick your feet.
Lick your *beep*.

And the best thing D.N.A. is a puzzle, but a very logical one.

When you have watched bio engineering students doing their *basic* experiments with basic yeast you will be astonished what they can achieve by just playing around.

DNA is a perfect self assembling puzzle you will quickly see how things work out.

Basically what I want to lay out is that there is not just even the slightest chance of succeeding to conceal that information from drug makers, because they will find out otherwise because in DNA if it works .. you can redo steps or start variations and your own research.

So yes, the cartels will find a way and hey .. they won the war on drugs haven't they?

Also in case genetic engineering is too complex there is still Afghanistan.

1.) So you have many (and I mean many) "underpaid" bio engineering students.

2.) Decent equipment makes everything easier, but you can built that equipment, that knowledge cannot be subdued(it's too widespread)

3.) You have "fungus"(yeast) DNA everywhere

4.) Variations - If you want to find an unknown strain .. go to a brothel, public toilet, the more cultures clash .. the more variations you will find in one spot.

5.) you have scientific journals (and you also have a black list of crap journals)

6.) Money = Resources (Hey we are talking here about drug cartels that have no problem to just loose cocain worth being 200 mUSD)

7.) We have a black pharma market that produces counterfight - and at a 50% chance high quality - drugs for old mens problems from industrial scale made basic chemicals. And nobody can stop them - or wants to.

I can't wait for Anheuser-Busch gets ahold of this

[SpankiMonki]

I can see the Super Bowl commercials now. It'll be like that Farley/Sandler bit on SNL, except the gays will be substituted with heroin models.

Re:the inevitable

[Dunbal]

Dude have you tried this bread? No. Problem. At all. Hang on..zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Re:Where's the Tea Party When You Need Them?

[spauldo]

We could spend one quarter of the money on treatment programs and end up with fewer drug abusers than we've managed with the "War on Drugs".

That's not how libertarians work.

It's more like:

1) Abolish laws that make drugs illegal, thus saving money on prisons and law enforcement, and lower taxes accordingly
2) Let addicted people pay for their own treatment, "entitlement" and whatnot
3) Wealthy Americans install better security or live in gated communities, paid for by the savings in taxes
4) Who cares about everyone else? If they were important, they'd have money.

Re:Yeast Banned

[HornWumpus]

The only thing that stops you from guzzling Laudanum is the law?

In the USA all drugs are _readily_ available to any adult that want's them. Laws mean nothing.

Narcobeer?

[morethanapapercert]

I seem to be the only one so far to make the connection to narcobeer. Alan Cole and Chris Bunch wrote a series of military sci-fi (The Sten Chronicles) in which narcobeer is the drink of choice for low status migrant workers. Corporations in the sci-fi equivalent of mining/single industry towns would encourage the consumption of it as a means of controlling the "migs".

Triticum aestivum spelta

[tepples]

Fun fact: Spelt (Triticum aestivum spelta) is a subspecies of wheat that has become more popular over the past couple decades for needing fewer fertilizers than common wheat. Thus "spelled" has come to be spelled "spelled" to distinguish it from spelt.

And America south of 49 degrees north latitude has been not an English colony for nearly 240 years.

Re:Triticum aestivum spelta

[RabidReindeer]

The last time I saw the word "smelt" outside of metallurgy was in The Hobbit.

The English language has been losing its grammatical nuances for a long time, which is why we don't wear shoon on our feet anymore. Although I suspect that the sheer weight of so many non-native English speakers participating these days has had an accelerating effect.

Britain will just have to console itself with the fact that Americans are giving up on "gray" in favor of "gree", I mean, "grey".

But that's a horse of another colour.

Re:Triticum aestivum spelta

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Really? We have a small oily fish by that name. Also known to pioneers as a Candlefish, because you could catch them by the bucketfull, smoke them, and either eat them or actually *use them as candles* in your log cabin for months after.

Re:Triticum aestivum spelta

[jblues]

Fun fact: Spelt (Triticum aestivum spelta) is a subspecies of wheat that has become more popular over the past couple decades for needing fewer fertilizers than common wheat. Thus "spelled" has come to be spelled "spelled" to distinguish it from spelt.

And America south of 49 degrees north latitude has been not an English colony for nearly 240 years.

As I understand it Spelt is wheat's wild ancestor. Now that its being cultivated there will probably be selective pressure through that process turning in to something else. Perhaps we could call the new stuff 'Spelled'

But on a very serious note: How long before these new strains of yeast become the dominant strains? It sounds like Ergot all over again, with a new twist. In the middle ages a fungus called Ergot got into Rye grain stores causing trip-out LSD like effects. Folks had visions, heard the voice of god and generally went around doing all kinds of crazy things. Witch hunts, random decapitations, etc. But it all remained just under the medieval radar, since folks were more than half-way mad anyway. This time a slice of morphine-laced soft-white will smack the people out and have them doze around like zombies all day. Again no body will notice, since that is the status quo for our age :)

Re:Triticum aestivum spelta

[youngone]

And America south of 49 degrees north latitude has been not an English colony for nearly 240 years.

What!? Why was I not told of this?

eliminating the demand?

[Lead Butthead]

... build large industrial crematorium and air tight shower rooms?

Re:the inevitable

[BronsCon]

Damn.

Switch to Sudafed OM

[tepples]

You may be having an XY problem. You say you want Sudafed but what you most likely want is a decongested nose. I'm no physician, so I'll just tell you what worked for me: I switched from pseudoephedrine tablets to oxymetazoline nasal spray. Brands include Afrin, Sudafed OM, and store brands. To avoid dependency, I use it in one nostril in the morning and the other at night.

Re:Switch to Sudafed OM

[jdavidb]

+1 As an old Perl programmer, I have to appreciate any response that mentions the phrase "XY problem." :)

Re:Switch to Sudafed OM

[tepples]

addicted to nose spray? I have never heard of such a sillyness!

You have now. It's called Rhinitis medicamentosa or rebound congestion.

Re:the inevitable

[gtbritishskull]

It can happen

.

Better Drinking

[AnotherAnonymousUser]

Now you can literally drink to numb the pain :).

Re:the inevitable

[Anonymice]

Wut? There's no alcohol in yeast - it (& carbon dioxide) are created as a by-product in a warm, damp, sugar-rich environment. You'd have to be really lax with your storage methods if you're getting alcohol in your bread mixture.

Already proven pointless

[jbmartin6]

The whole idea is just DRM on meth. It is just information, and you can't lock up information.

Re:Dumb dumb dumb

[0123456]

Statists believe everyone is as stupid as they are.

While widespread availbility of narco-yeast seems a bad idea, the only way to prevent it is a global total-surveillance totalitarian state. Which would be far worse.

Most likely the cartels are way ahead of government science in these areas, as they have a ton of money and an eager market.

Re:Where's the Tea Party When You Need Them?

[rea1l1]

Incorrect or simply poorly portrayed.

Libertarians believe:
1) Laws restricting private property are unlawful in a republic ("public thing") as the republican structure does not have the authority to control any individual unless that individual is breaching the rights of another. A republic is not supposed to have anymore authority than any individual member of the society. Republics are created for the common good, such as for the building and maintence of roads and the defense of the rights of people. What we have today is a form of mob rule, a false democracy, as the republic has completely and entirely breached its founding principles and has been unlawfull, in practice, been converted into a raw democracy.

2) Government does not have the authority to force an individual to do anything WHATSOEVER, unless that individual is explicitly damaging another person's rights. IT IS NOT that libertarians do not believe we should help addicts, but it is NOT THE GOVERNMENT'S JOB. Any other organization may fill the role.

3) What?

4) What? You have a rather prejudiced view of Libertarian?

Re:the inevitable

[BronsCon]

Starches process into sugars. What do you think happens while the bread is rising?

Misquote?

[A non moose cow]

Shouldn't it have said:

"The world should take steps to head that off, they argue, by locking up the bioengineered yeast strains and restricting access to the DNA that would let competing drug cartels reproduce them."

But...it's GMO!

[Ranbot]

No self-respecting drug addict would use franken-morphine!

opiates in your beer

[dala1]

I'd just like to point out to all those mentioning it that you really don't want opiates in your beer. It's a good way to stop breathing.

Re:the inevitable

[dsmatthews9379]

... such a yeast infection could be fatal. The weapon potential of this technology is horrific. Only if it is done in a totally synthetic life-form (incompatible DNA and dependant on unnatural food sources), that has zero chance of surviving in the wild, would it be remotely safe for even the big pharmacology companies to consider trying.

Re:Where's the Tea Party When You Need Them?

[spauldo]

1) Your idea of a republic doesn't resemble any actual government in the world. Idealism is nice, I suppose, but that's just not the way things work. Also, I've met quite a few libertarians who believe (as did pre-civil war Democrats) that the government shouldn't be responsible for public infrastructure, such as roads. The free market - that magic bullet that fixes everything - will take care of it.

2) I was not arguing that the government would force addicts to seek treatment, only that libertarians would offer no assistance in doing so. And from what I've seen, many libertarians fully believe that no, they should not help addicts.

3) You saying this doesn't happen? Also,

4) The idea that those with money shouldn't be responsible for those without money (at least insofar as taxation is concerned) is one of the core principles of libertarianism. Anything else would be wealth redistribution. To quote one libertarian I know personally, "that's what churches are for."

Just as an aside, I do generally agree with the libertarian ideas on social issues. Too bad the rest of the Republican party doesn't.

So, When Will This Be Cheap?

[WheezyJoe]

This thread is making me wonder, Is it feasible we will someday see a USB-like device for home organic synthesis, like a 3-D printer but for products of organic chemistry?
Impossible? Waiting to happen?

Re:So, When Will This Be Cheap?

[inflamed]

This thread is making me wonder, Is it feasible we will someday see a USB-like device for home organic synthesis, like a 3-D printer but for products of organic chemistry? Impossible? Waiting to happen?

The device you propose has an unlikelihood level somewhere between human immortality and teleportation.

never mind the cartels

[ihtoit]

AKA "Big pHarma" (yes, I did that deliberately), what about those who actually need the chemical yet are priced out or legaled out due to BP's greed and the terminal myopia of the legislature? Don't they get to grow their own?

I grow my own elder and willow, you get some amazing stuff out of those. Including a form of aspirin out of the willow bark that doesn't cause my throat to close.

restricting access to the DNA

[manu0601]

restricting access to the DNA

What a joke! Do they plan to introduce DRM-enabled DNA?

more laws and regulations now

[paul mafinga]

The record of the drug war has been phenomenal -- every weekend around 22 black males die in drug turf battles across the USA.

The legal industrial complex in the tax and spend social utopias is making so much progress. When they catch an armed gang banger, they can no longer afford to cage and feed them. They just release them back to the streets with zero time, another felony conviction, see you in a couple weeks, no room at the Inn. It's really working out well for America.

More laws and regulations -- on yeast -- are practically guaranteed to take the drug war to an entirely new level of success.

Good

[Karmashock]

The drug war needs to be made as impotent as possible.

Beyond that, one thing that would be quite interesting is if long term medication could be administered by adding the bacteria to your gut. So it just bred down there naturally turning some of your food on a regular basis into whatever drug you need.

Re:Just grow a few poppies

[inflamed]

It is perfectly legal to grow poppies. They grow very easily and is practically a weed. Since it is so easy, why would one want to use yeast?

No, it's not perfectly legal (in the US) and may be perfectly illegal in other jurisdictions. That said, they grow like weeds in the part of Canada where I live - and they are the very first item in our criminal code's list of illegal substances

Re:This will make the Republicans so happy,s...

[tsotha]

Except if you actually read the pages you're linking you see the drugs didn't get shipped to LA as part of the "Iran Contra fiasco". Despite the screeching from Crazy Maxine, the stories directly linking Iran Contra to drugs in the US turned out to be poorly sourced bullshit.

Re:Where's the Tea Party When You Need Them?

[tsotha]

Despite what you hear from nutty ACs, Tea Party groups are based around fiscal conservatism. It's not a true party, and most of them choose not to take positions on issues unrelated to taxes and spending.

Re:Where's the Tea Party When You Need Them?

[dave420]

There you go again misusing the word "republic". It doesn't help your argument that the very first point you make is flat-out wrong. All I have learned from that is some Libertarians seem to think they know more than they actually do, which on reflection would explain an awful lot of things.

Re:the inevitable

[Cocioc]

As far as I know (from my home-brewing), starches are not fermentable (that's why you mash the grain prior to pitching the yeast, to convert the starches into fermentable sugars). The yeast in bread makes the bread rise by using the fermentable sugars in the dough, and as a by-product CO2 is released, which makes the bread rise. Some alcohol may/amy not be also be realeased (I never looked into the bread process), as based on what I know, the yeast starts producing alcohol as a biproduct only when it runs out of oxigen (until then it keeps multiplying). So, going back to your statement, starches are not processed by the yeast in any way. Sugars are processed into some other stuff and also CO2, that's what happens when the bread is rising.

Re:the inevitable

[BronsCon]

Actually, yeast convert carbohydrates—starches and sugars—to alcohol and carbon dioxide gas. That article is about as plain-english of an explanation as you'll find; and yes, it even confirms that the starches are processed into sugars before being turned into alcohol and CO2. All the yeast can make from a simple sugar (which, aside from starches which the yeast breaks into simple sugars via enzymes, is all yeast can process) is CO2 and alcohol and, since sugar isn't pure carbon, if CO2 is being produced, so it alcohol.

Unless you've discovered a strain of yeast that can transmute matter at the atomic level, in which case you need to apply for some grants to further that line of research.

Re:right here, chump

[WheezyJoe]

The insightful AC forgot to cite, but the title was enough for a Google search. First hit: No need for the pharmacy; just press print. When it comes out, let's call it Dial-A-Drug and plug it in right next to the fridge.

Need synthesis of apomorphine as well

[photoinchicago]

Apomorphine is a blocker for the effects of morphine like substances. Don't understand why it isn't used here in the USA,

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