Analysis of UK Drug Problem
http://www.ukdpc.org.uk/docs/UKDPC%20drug%20policy%20review.pdf
by
Peter Reuter and Alex Stevens
Saturday
FDA bans "Cocaine" (Street Drug Alternatives)
http://www.fda.gov/foi/warning_letters/b6312d.htm
WARNING LETTER CERTIFIED MAIL RETURN RECEIPT REQUESTED April 4, 2007 James KirbySenior Partner/FounderRedux Beverages, LLC41605 Elm Street, #6Murrieta, CA 92562
Dear Mr. Kirby:
The Food and Drug Administration conducted an inspection of your firm, Drink Reboot, on February 14, 2007. This letter concerns your firm's marketing of the product "Cocaine" as a dietary supplement on your website, http://www.drinkcocaine.co/. According to information on your website, Cocaine is marketed as an alternative to an illicit street drug, and certain ingredients contained therein are intended to prevent, treat, or cure disease conditions.As explained in greater detail below, dietary supplements are products that e intended to supplement the diet . Street drug alternatives, i.e., products that claim to mimic he effects of recreational drugs, are not intended to supplement the diet and, as a result, cannot lawfully be marketed as dietary supplements.In addition, a dietary supplement may not bear claims that it prevents or treats a disease, except for authorized health claims about reducing the risk of a disease. Other disease prevention and treatment claims render the product a drug subject to the drug requirements of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (Act).The following statements that are noted on your product container or on your website demonstrate that your product is intended as an alternative to an illicit street drug:"The Legal Alternative"The product name is "Cocaine," and the letters in the product name appear to be spelled out in a white granular substance that resembles cocaine powder."Speed in a Can""Liquid Cocaine""Cocaine - Instant Rush.""The question you have to ask yourself is: "Can I handle the rush?"This beverage should be consumed by responsible adults. Failure to adhere to this warning may result in excess excitement, stamina, . . . and possible feeling of euphoria."The following statements on your website about an ingredient of "Cocaine" demonstrate that your product is intended to treat or prevent certain diseases:*"Inositol -... reduces cholesterol in the blood; it helps prevent hardening of the arteries, and may protect nerve fibers from excess glucose damage. Inositol has a natural calming effect and may be used in the treatment of anxiety, depression, and obsessive-compulsive disorder without the side effects of prescription medications."Street Drug AlternativesFDA has become aware of the proliferation of various diet supplement products that are being manufactured, marketed, or distributed as alternatives to illicit street drugs. Street drug alternatives are not intended to supplement the diet. 21 U.S.C. 321(ff). Accordingly, street drug alternatives do not qualify as dietary supplements. See United States v. Undetermined Quantities of Articles of Drugs, 145 F. Supp. 2d 692 (D. Md. 2001). In March of 2000, FDA made available a guidance for industry on street drug alternatives. This document contains additional information and is available at http://www.fda.gov/cder/guidance/index.htmDisease ClaimsYour product, Cocaine, is a drug, as defined by Section 201(g)(1) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 321(g)(1), because it is intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease, 21 U.S.C. §§ 321(g), 321(ff), and 343(r)(6). Moreover, this product is a new drug, as defined by Section 201(p) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 321(p), because it is not generally recognized as safe and effective for its labeled uses. Under Sections 301(d) and 505(a) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. §§ 331(d) and 355(a), a new drug may not be introduced or delivered for introduction into interstate commerce unless an FDA-approved application is in effect for it. Your sale of Cocaine without an approved application violates these provisions of the Act.Furthermore, because this product is offered for conditions that are not amenable to self-diagnosis and treatment by individuals who are not medical practitioners, adequate directions cannot be written so that a layman can use this product safely for its intended uses. Thus, Cocaine's labeling fails to bear adequate directions for its intended uses, causing it to be misbranded under Section 502(f)(1) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 352(f)(1).The above violations are not intended to be an all-inclusive list of deficiencies. It is your responsibility to ensure that the drug products that you manufacture or distribute meet all of the requirements of the Act and its implementing regulations. Federal agencies are advised of the issuance of all warning letters about drugs and devices so that they may take this information into account when considering the award of contracts.You must immediately correct these violations. If you do not immediately correct them, you may be subject to enforcement action against you without further notice. The Act provides for the seizure of illegal products and for an injunction against the manufacturer and distributors of illegal products. Individuals and businesses that violate the Act may also be subject to criminal prosecution.You must notify this office in writing within 15 working days of receipt of this letter as to the steps that you have taken to correct the above-listed violations and to assure that similar violations will not recur. If corrective action cannot be completed within 15 working days, state the reason for the delay and the time within which the corrections will be made. Additionally, if your firm does not manufacture the product identified above, your reply should include the name and address of the manufacturer. If the firm from which you receive the product is not the manufacturer, please include the name of your supplier in addition to the manufacturer.Please address your written response to the attention of:Pamela B. SchweikertDirector, Compliance BranchUnited States Food and Drug Administration19701 FairchildIrvine, CA 92612-2506If you have any questions about the content of this letter please contact Mr. John J. Stamp at (949) 608-4464.Sincerely yours,/S/Alonza E. CruseDistrict DirectorCc: California Board of Pharmacy1625 N, Market Blvd.Suite N219Sacramento, CA 95834
http://www.fda.gov/cder/guidance/3602fnl.htm
Guidance for Industry
Street Drug Alternatives
U.S. Department of Health and Human ServicesFood and Drug AdministrationCenter for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER)March 2000Compliance
[Acrobat Version of this Document]
Additional copies of this Guidance are available from:Office of Training and CommunicationsDivision of Communications ManagementDrug Information Branch, HFD-210Center for Drug Evaluation and ResearchFood and Drug Administration5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20857(Phone 301-827-4573)
Guidance for Industry
Street Drug Alternatives
I. Introduction
This guidance is intended for those persons who are manufacturing, marketing, or distributing alternatives to illicit street drugs. FDA considers any product that is promoted as a street drug alternative to be an unapproved new drug and a misbranded drug in violation of sections 505 and 502 of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (the Act). Such violations may result in regulatory action, including seizure and injunction.
II. BACKGROUND
The Agency has become aware of the proliferation of various products that are being manufactured, marketed, or distributed as alternatives to illicit street drugs (street drug alternatives). FDA is concerned that these products are being abused by individuals, including minors, and pose a potential threat to the public health.
Street drug alternatives are generally labeled as containing botanicals, and some are also labeled as containing other ingredients, such as vitamins, minerals, or amino acids. They are marketed under a variety of brand names with claims implying that these products mimic the effects of controlled substances. Many of these products are promoted on the Internet and in counterculture magazines as alternatives to illicit street drugs such as MDMA (4-methyl-2, dimethoxyamphetamine), a methamphetamine analogue, also known as ecstasy, XTC, and X. Other examples of products whose names imply street drug alternative use are e-Ludes, Hextacy, and Herbal Koke.
These products are intended to be used for recreational purposes to effect psychological states (e.g., to get high, to promote euphoria, or to induce hallucinations) and have potential for abuse. FDA considers these street drug alternatives to be unapproved new drugs and misbranded drugs under sections 505 and 502 of the Act.
FDA is also aware that some of these street drug alternatives are being marketed as dietary supplements. FDA does not consider street drug alternatives to be dietary supplements. The term dietary supplement as defined in section 201(ff) of the Act means, inter alia, a product "intended to supplement the diet." While the Act does not elaborate on the meaning of this phrase, many congressional findings, set forth in the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994, suggest that dietary supplements are intended to be used to augment the diet to promote health and reduce the risk of disease. FDA does not believe that street drug alternatives are intended to be used to augment the diet to promote health or reduce the risk of disease. Moreover, FDA considers the diet to be composed of usual food and drink that may be designed to meet specific nutritional requirements. Illicit street drugs are not food or drink, and neither they, nor alternative street drugs, can be said to supplement the diet. Rather, these products are intended to be used for recreational purposes to effect psychological states (e.g., to get high, to promote euphoria, or to induce hallucinations). Accordingly, street drug alternatives are not intended to supplement the diet and are not dietary supplements. This position is consistent with that set forth at 62 Fed. Reg. 30678, 30699-700 (June 4, 1997).
III. POLICY
FDA considers any product that is promoted as a street drug alternative to be an unapproved new drug and a misbranded drug in violation of sections 505 and 502 of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. Such violations may result in regulatory action, including seizure and injunction
Ginger Jake and the blues: a tragic song of poisoning.
Jake Leg
Depression-era drinkers of illicit ginger alcohol foundit numbed more than just their worries
“I CAN’T EAT, I CAN’T TALK,” complained blues artists the Allen Brothers in 1930. “Been drinking mean jake, Lord,” they bemoaned. “Now I can’t walk.” The song was titled “The Jake Walk Blues,” and the Allen Brothers weren’t the first performers to address this peculiar, depression-era malady: It’s widely believed that a blues singer named Ishmon Bracey actually diagnosed the source of the infirmity, which consists of potentially crippling paralysis of the legs, in his song “Jake Liquor Blues.” The problem was jake, which was a nickname for Jamaican Ginger extract.
The extract was used for its medicinal qualities since the 19th century in the United States, as it is reputed to help relieve nausea and diarrhea. With the passing of the Volstead Act in 1919, the production of all commercial alcohol was forbidden in the United States, but for one important exception: medicinal products. Jake, which had a 70 percent alcohol content and was available at any corner drugstore, became a popular beverage. It was inexpensive and mixed well with soft drinks such as Coca Cola; additionally it was useful as an additive to bathtub gins and moonshines to mask the harsh, acidic taste of these illicit beverages. Because of jake’s low price, it was particularly popular among White working class and African-American tipplers. These would be the group hardest hit when jake suddenly turned poisonous.
The Food and Drug division of the U.S. Department of Agriculture got wise to the growing popularity of Jamaican Ginger extract. By March of 1930, the extract was no longer legal. But, in the latter days of the Prohibition, illicit alcohol manufacturers took such bans as something of a dare. In particular, Harry Gross, the president of a Boston-based firm called Hub Products, decided that Jamaican Ginger extract couldn’t go by way of the street grates.
In late January, 1930, along with a chemist friend, Gross found that by adding triorthocresylphosphate phosphate, (TOCP) to Jamaican Ginger extract, it would essentially hide any signs of significant alcohol from government tests. TOCP was an industrial chemical, a “plasticizer” added to materials such as plastics to keep them pliable. The addition was tasteless, odorless, and colorless, and thought to be harmless. It wasn’t. TOCP proved to had one significant side effect: It killed cells in the central nervous system, particularly the spinal cord.
The first sign of Jamaican ginger poisoning was a paralysis of the lower extremities known as “Jake leg.” If victims of Jake Leg had to get from one place to another, they strode by way of the “Jake Walk”, a distinctive gait of high-knees and sloppy, ground slapping steps. There are no records of people overdosing or dying as a result of Jamaican Ginger paralysis, but for some the effects never completely wore off. Estimates range between 50,000 and 100,000 people having been permanently crippled with partial paralysis.
The source of the poisoning was quickly tracked down and taken off the market, and Harry Gross himself was punished with a two-year prison sentence. As the victims of Jake Leg were mostly poor and migratory workers, their plight quickly fell from public view, but for a dozen or so blues and folk songs that essayed their condition.
Jamaican Ginger is still widely available and remains a popular folk remedy. Many products are made with it as a defining ingredient, including tea candles and ginger beer. In fact, there is a French cocktail that called for mango, rum, and ginger extract (minus TOCP, of course). This fruity mixture might well cause an embarrassing loss of control of the lower extremities, but we promise this: it’ll be temporary. (Courtney Mault)
JAKE LEG.(outbreak of paralysis in 1930s)
Source: The New Yorker
Publication Date: 15-SEP-03
Author: Baum, Dan
Dr. John Morgan, a professor at the City University of New York Medical School, likes to call himself a pharmaco-ethnomusicologist. His first love is early-American vernacular music, and his apartment, on the Upper West Side, is stacked with ancient records. Some years back, Morgan was listening to the Allen Brothers' "Jake Walk Blues," released in 1930. In a kazoo-backed Tennessee twang, the brothers sang, "I can't eat, I can't talk, drinking mean jake, Lord, I can't walk." The lyrics pinballed through Morgan's memory and lit up twice. First was a lecture he'd heard in medical school, in 1961: a professor had mentioned a strange paralysis called "jake walk" that he had observed during his residency in Cincinnati in the thirties. Next was a face from Morgan's childhood in Ohio, that of a legless beggar called Nigger John. Nigger John had had the "jake leg," Morgan recalled his mother telling him. She had said it in a way that discouraged further inquiry. Stout and bearded, Morgan, who is sixty-three, delicately set the arm of a turntable on a thick, spinning record, and after a moment's hiss we heard what sounded like pure despair. "Ishmon Bracey, one of the Mississippi greats," Morgan whispered. From seven decades back, Bracey wailed, "Jake leg, jake leg, what in the world you trying to do? Seems like everybody in the city's messed up on account of drinking you." Morgan has collected a number of songs about the jake leg or the jake walk. "From them we learn that some new kind of paralysis appeared in 1930," he said. "No songs mention it before then." He began bending back blunt fingers. "The paralysis was brought on by drinking something called 'jake.' It afflicted enough souls to instigate an entire subset of folk music. Blacks and whites were affected. It rendered men impotent. And it was no longer inspiring musicians by 1934, which meant it was a cataclysmic but discrete event." He sat back and spread his hands. "Behold the study, through folk music, of a substance-induced epidemic," he said. "Pharmaco-ethnomusicology." Morgan has been researching the jake leg on and off for twenty-seven years. He has put together a CD collection of seventeen tunes mentioning it, including one by Gene Autry, and he has written half a dozen medical-journal articles on the subject. In the nineteen-seventies, he interviewed a number of the epidemic's surviving victims and collected his data, a teeming bazaar of anecdote and chemistry, in a huge manuscript that has been gathering dust for years. He also has a filthy carton full of clippings. With a little prodding, he agreed to turn all the material over to me. "I'm not giving up on the story myself," he said. "I just don't mind someone else telling it, too." As far as we know, the outbreak was first detected in Oklahoma City, by Ephraim Goldfain, a thirty-four-year-old physician who had emigrated from Romania as a child and had put himself through medical school by operating a streetcar. He was bookishly handsome, with swept-back red hair, a cleft chin, and round horn-rimmed glasses. With a few partners, he ran a thirty-five-bed clinic called the Reconstruction Hospital. On February 27, 1930, a man whose name is lost to history staggered in off the street. The patient's feet dangled like a marionette's, so that walking involved swinging them forward and slapping them onto the floor. He told Goldfain that he had strained himself lifting an automobile, and a couple of days later his calves had begun to tingle. Then his legs went useless below the knee. He wasn't in any pain, he said, but he could barely get around. Sudden paralysis in those days usually meant polio, but to Goldfain, who recounted the patient's history in a medical journal, this didn't look like polio. He didn't pay much attention to the story about lifting the car. Goldfain thought the man's symptoms suggested lead poisoning. He ordered blood and spinal-fluid tests. They came back negative. Later that day, another man appeared, exhibiting the same bizarre palsy. And then another. By the end of the day, Goldfain's clinic had admitted five patients with the distinctive paralysis. One of them, a podiatrist, claimed he had caught the illness from his own patients, and handed Goldfain a list of the ones who had gone foot-floppy in the past few days. The list had sixty-five names. Oklahoma in 1930 was a hard-luck place. Thanks to price-killing oversupplies of wheat and cotton, its people had gotten a head start on the Depression. The same day that Goldfain saw his five patients, the American Hospital Association criticized Oklahoma City's medical preparedness, noting that it had fewer hospital beds per capita than any other city of its size. Now it was struggling with what looked like a full-blown epidemic. In one frenetic day, Goldfain visited thirty men on the podiatrist's list, and in the succeeding weeks followed up with other visits. The men's feet dangled, their legs hung dead below the knee. Some could get around on crutches, some couldn't make their legs move at all, some could use neither their legs nor their hands. Goldfain knew at once that this was no contagion. No children were sick, and hardly any women. The men Goldfain saw all lived in a seedy part of town known for bootlegging. They struck him as being ashamed...
Ginger Jake and the blues: a tragic song of poisoning.
Vet Hum Toxicol. 1995 Jun;37(3):252-4.
Ginger Jake and the blues: a tragic song of poisoning.
Woolf AD.
Massachusetts Poison Control System, Boston 02115, USA.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=7571360&query_hl=4&itool=pubmed_DocSum Prohibition, "The Noble Experiment", ushered in speakeasys, gangsters and bathtub gin in the 1920s. For many Americans, however, it led to a period of joblessness, hard times, and austerity. The story of Jamaican Ginger ("Jake") poisoning, in which batches of a cheap, alcoholic tonic were laced with tri-ortho cresyl phosphate (TOCP) is one of cynical despicable behavior on the part of those responsible and a tragic enduring legacy for the invisible group of Americans who were victimized. TOCP, a potent organophosphate, caused an axonal dying-back neuropathy affecting mainly large muscle groups. Jake poisoning struck about 50,000 adults, mostly poor middle-aged vagrants with little medical care or social standing. Their symptoms and stories were told not only in medical journals but also in song. Hillbilly jazzmen sang of the "Jake Leg Blues" with a resignation to the fate of their own undoing, brought on by the intemperance of a wasted life. The postscript is grim--those responsible received little punishment; many who drank "Jake" were left both uncompensated and crippled by irreversible paralysis.
Depression-era drinkers of illicit ginger alcohol foundit numbed more than just their worries
“I CAN’T EAT, I CAN’T TALK,” complained blues artists the Allen Brothers in 1930. “Been drinking mean jake, Lord,” they bemoaned. “Now I can’t walk.” The song was titled “The Jake Walk Blues,” and the Allen Brothers weren’t the first performers to address this peculiar, depression-era malady: It’s widely believed that a blues singer named Ishmon Bracey actually diagnosed the source of the infirmity, which consists of potentially crippling paralysis of the legs, in his song “Jake Liquor Blues.” The problem was jake, which was a nickname for Jamaican Ginger extract.
The extract was used for its medicinal qualities since the 19th century in the United States, as it is reputed to help relieve nausea and diarrhea. With the passing of the Volstead Act in 1919, the production of all commercial alcohol was forbidden in the United States, but for one important exception: medicinal products. Jake, which had a 70 percent alcohol content and was available at any corner drugstore, became a popular beverage. It was inexpensive and mixed well with soft drinks such as Coca Cola; additionally it was useful as an additive to bathtub gins and moonshines to mask the harsh, acidic taste of these illicit beverages. Because of jake’s low price, it was particularly popular among White working class and African-American tipplers. These would be the group hardest hit when jake suddenly turned poisonous.
The Food and Drug division of the U.S. Department of Agriculture got wise to the growing popularity of Jamaican Ginger extract. By March of 1930, the extract was no longer legal. But, in the latter days of the Prohibition, illicit alcohol manufacturers took such bans as something of a dare. In particular, Harry Gross, the president of a Boston-based firm called Hub Products, decided that Jamaican Ginger extract couldn’t go by way of the street grates.
In late January, 1930, along with a chemist friend, Gross found that by adding triorthocresylphosphate phosphate, (TOCP) to Jamaican Ginger extract, it would essentially hide any signs of significant alcohol from government tests. TOCP was an industrial chemical, a “plasticizer” added to materials such as plastics to keep them pliable. The addition was tasteless, odorless, and colorless, and thought to be harmless. It wasn’t. TOCP proved to had one significant side effect: It killed cells in the central nervous system, particularly the spinal cord.
The first sign of Jamaican ginger poisoning was a paralysis of the lower extremities known as “Jake leg.” If victims of Jake Leg had to get from one place to another, they strode by way of the “Jake Walk”, a distinctive gait of high-knees and sloppy, ground slapping steps. There are no records of people overdosing or dying as a result of Jamaican Ginger paralysis, but for some the effects never completely wore off. Estimates range between 50,000 and 100,000 people having been permanently crippled with partial paralysis.
The source of the poisoning was quickly tracked down and taken off the market, and Harry Gross himself was punished with a two-year prison sentence. As the victims of Jake Leg were mostly poor and migratory workers, their plight quickly fell from public view, but for a dozen or so blues and folk songs that essayed their condition.
Jamaican Ginger is still widely available and remains a popular folk remedy. Many products are made with it as a defining ingredient, including tea candles and ginger beer. In fact, there is a French cocktail that called for mango, rum, and ginger extract (minus TOCP, of course). This fruity mixture might well cause an embarrassing loss of control of the lower extremities, but we promise this: it’ll be temporary. (Courtney Mault)
JAKE LEG.(outbreak of paralysis in 1930s)
Source: The New Yorker
Publication Date: 15-SEP-03
Author: Baum, Dan
Dr. John Morgan, a professor at the City University of New York Medical School, likes to call himself a pharmaco-ethnomusicologist. His first love is early-American vernacular music, and his apartment, on the Upper West Side, is stacked with ancient records. Some years back, Morgan was listening to the Allen Brothers' "Jake Walk Blues," released in 1930. In a kazoo-backed Tennessee twang, the brothers sang, "I can't eat, I can't talk, drinking mean jake, Lord, I can't walk." The lyrics pinballed through Morgan's memory and lit up twice. First was a lecture he'd heard in medical school, in 1961: a professor had mentioned a strange paralysis called "jake walk" that he had observed during his residency in Cincinnati in the thirties. Next was a face from Morgan's childhood in Ohio, that of a legless beggar called Nigger John. Nigger John had had the "jake leg," Morgan recalled his mother telling him. She had said it in a way that discouraged further inquiry. Stout and bearded, Morgan, who is sixty-three, delicately set the arm of a turntable on a thick, spinning record, and after a moment's hiss we heard what sounded like pure despair. "Ishmon Bracey, one of the Mississippi greats," Morgan whispered. From seven decades back, Bracey wailed, "Jake leg, jake leg, what in the world you trying to do? Seems like everybody in the city's messed up on account of drinking you." Morgan has collected a number of songs about the jake leg or the jake walk. "From them we learn that some new kind of paralysis appeared in 1930," he said. "No songs mention it before then." He began bending back blunt fingers. "The paralysis was brought on by drinking something called 'jake.' It afflicted enough souls to instigate an entire subset of folk music. Blacks and whites were affected. It rendered men impotent. And it was no longer inspiring musicians by 1934, which meant it was a cataclysmic but discrete event." He sat back and spread his hands. "Behold the study, through folk music, of a substance-induced epidemic," he said. "Pharmaco-ethnomusicology." Morgan has been researching the jake leg on and off for twenty-seven years. He has put together a CD collection of seventeen tunes mentioning it, including one by Gene Autry, and he has written half a dozen medical-journal articles on the subject. In the nineteen-seventies, he interviewed a number of the epidemic's surviving victims and collected his data, a teeming bazaar of anecdote and chemistry, in a huge manuscript that has been gathering dust for years. He also has a filthy carton full of clippings. With a little prodding, he agreed to turn all the material over to me. "I'm not giving up on the story myself," he said. "I just don't mind someone else telling it, too." As far as we know, the outbreak was first detected in Oklahoma City, by Ephraim Goldfain, a thirty-four-year-old physician who had emigrated from Romania as a child and had put himself through medical school by operating a streetcar. He was bookishly handsome, with swept-back red hair, a cleft chin, and round horn-rimmed glasses. With a few partners, he ran a thirty-five-bed clinic called the Reconstruction Hospital. On February 27, 1930, a man whose name is lost to history staggered in off the street. The patient's feet dangled like a marionette's, so that walking involved swinging them forward and slapping them onto the floor. He told Goldfain that he had strained himself lifting an automobile, and a couple of days later his calves had begun to tingle. Then his legs went useless below the knee. He wasn't in any pain, he said, but he could barely get around. Sudden paralysis in those days usually meant polio, but to Goldfain, who recounted the patient's history in a medical journal, this didn't look like polio. He didn't pay much attention to the story about lifting the car. Goldfain thought the man's symptoms suggested lead poisoning. He ordered blood and spinal-fluid tests. They came back negative. Later that day, another man appeared, exhibiting the same bizarre palsy. And then another. By the end of the day, Goldfain's clinic had admitted five patients with the distinctive paralysis. One of them, a podiatrist, claimed he had caught the illness from his own patients, and handed Goldfain a list of the ones who had gone foot-floppy in the past few days. The list had sixty-five names. Oklahoma in 1930 was a hard-luck place. Thanks to price-killing oversupplies of wheat and cotton, its people had gotten a head start on the Depression. The same day that Goldfain saw his five patients, the American Hospital Association criticized Oklahoma City's medical preparedness, noting that it had fewer hospital beds per capita than any other city of its size. Now it was struggling with what looked like a full-blown epidemic. In one frenetic day, Goldfain visited thirty men on the podiatrist's list, and in the succeeding weeks followed up with other visits. The men's feet dangled, their legs hung dead below the knee. Some could get around on crutches, some couldn't make their legs move at all, some could use neither their legs nor their hands. Goldfain knew at once that this was no contagion. No children were sick, and hardly any women. The men Goldfain saw all lived in a seedy part of town known for bootlegging. They struck him as being ashamed...
Ginger Jake and the blues: a tragic song of poisoning.
Vet Hum Toxicol. 1995 Jun;37(3):252-4.
Ginger Jake and the blues: a tragic song of poisoning.
Woolf AD.
Massachusetts Poison Control System, Boston 02115, USA.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=7571360&query_hl=4&itool=pubmed_DocSum Prohibition, "The Noble Experiment", ushered in speakeasys, gangsters and bathtub gin in the 1920s. For many Americans, however, it led to a period of joblessness, hard times, and austerity. The story of Jamaican Ginger ("Jake") poisoning, in which batches of a cheap, alcoholic tonic were laced with tri-ortho cresyl phosphate (TOCP) is one of cynical despicable behavior on the part of those responsible and a tragic enduring legacy for the invisible group of Americans who were victimized. TOCP, a potent organophosphate, caused an axonal dying-back neuropathy affecting mainly large muscle groups. Jake poisoning struck about 50,000 adults, mostly poor middle-aged vagrants with little medical care or social standing. Their symptoms and stories were told not only in medical journals but also in song. Hillbilly jazzmen sang of the "Jake Leg Blues" with a resignation to the fate of their own undoing, brought on by the intemperance of a wasted life. The postscript is grim--those responsible received little punishment; many who drank "Jake" were left both uncompensated and crippled by irreversible paralysis.
Inter-University Consortium and ECA
http://webapp.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR-STUDY/06153.xml
Also:
http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/THESAURUS/subject.xml?mode=entry&entry=drug%20abuseInter-University
Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)Drug Abuse Data Archives
ICPSR maintains and provides access to a vast archive of socialscience data for research and instruction. To ensure that dataresources are available to future generations of scholars, ICPSRpreserves data, migrating them to new storage media as changes intechnology warrant.
Also:
http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/cocoon/ICPSR/THESAURUS/subject.xml?mode=entry&entry=drug%20abuseInter-University
Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)Drug Abuse Data Archives
ICPSR maintains and provides access to a vast archive of socialscience data for research and instruction. To ensure that dataresources are available to future generations of scholars, ICPSRpreserves data, migrating them to new storage media as changes intechnology warrant.
60 Minutes: pharmaceutical industry
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/29/60minutes/printable2625305.sht
ml
Under The Influence
NEW YORK, April 1, 2007
CBS - 60 Minutes
If you have ever wondered why the cost of prescription drugs in the
United States are the highest in the world or why it's illegal to import
cheaper drugs from Canada or Mexico, you need look no further than the
pharmaceutical lobby and its influence in Washington, D.C.
According to a new report by the Center for Public Integrity,
congressmen are outnumbered two to one by lobbyists for an industry that
spends roughly a $100 million a year in campaign contributions and
lobbying expenses to protect its profits.
One reason those profits have exceeded Wall Street expectations is the
Medicare prescription drug bill. It was passed three-and-a-half years
ago, but as 60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft reports, its effects
are still reverberating through the halls of Congress, providing a
window into how the lobby works.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The unorthodox roll call on one of the most expensive bills ever placed
before the House of Representatives began in the middle of the night,
long after most people in Washington had switched off C-SPAN and gone to
sleep.
The only witnesses were congressional staffers, hundreds of lobbyists,
and U.S. Representatives like Dan Burton, R-Ind., and Walter Jones,
R-N.C.
"The pharmaceutical lobbyists wrote the bill," says Jones. "The bill was
over 1,000 pages. And it got to the members of the House that morning,
and we voted for it at about 3 a.m. in the morning."
Why did the vote finally take place at 3 a.m.?
"Well, I think a lot of the shenanigans that were going on that night,
they didn't want on national television in primetime," according to
Burton.
"I've been in politics for 22 years," says Jones, "and it was the
ugliest night I have ever seen in 22 years."
The legislation was the cornerstone of Republican's domestic agenda and
would extend limited prescription drugs coverage under Medicare to 41
million Americans, including 13 million who had never been covered
before.
At an estimated cost of just under $400 billion over 10 years, it was
the largest entitlement program in more than 40 years, and the debate
broke down along party lines.
But when it came time cast ballots, the Republican leadership discovered
that a number of key Republican congressmen had defected and joined the
Democrats, arguing that the bill was too expensive and a sellout to the
drug companies. Burton and Jones were among them.
"They're suppose to have 15 minutes to leave the voting machines open
and it was open for almost three hours," Burton explains. "The votes
were there to defeat the bill for two hours and 45 minutes and we had
leaders going around and gathering around individuals, trying to twist
their arms to get them to change their votes."
Jones says the arm-twisting was horrible.
"We had a good friend from Michigan, Nick Smith, and they threatened to
work against his son who wanted to run for his seat when he retired," he
recalls. "I saw a woman, a member of the House, a lady, crying when they
came around her, trying to get her to change her votes. It was -it was
ugly."
When the prescription drug bill finally passed shortly before dawn, in
the longest roll call in the history of the House of Representatives,
much of the credit went to former Congressman Billy Tauzin, R-La., who
steered it through the house.
"It's just a messy process," Tauzin says. "I mean, the old adage about
if you like sausage or laws, you should not watch either one of them
being made is true. It's a messy process."
Tauzin says that the voting machines were open for three hours "because
the vote wasn't finished."
As for arms being twisted? "People were being talked to," he says.
And of Walter Jones' comment that it was the "ugliest night" he had
"ever seen in politics in 22 years?"
"Well, he's a young member," counters Tauzin with a laugh. "Had he been
around for 25 years, he'd have seen some uglier nights."
It certainly wasn't ugly for the drug lobby which invested more than $10
million in campaign contributions during the last election and has been
a source of lucrative employment opportunities for congressmen when they
leave office.
Former senators Dennis Deconcini, D-Ariz., and Steve Symms, R-Idaho, and
former congressmen like Tom Downey, D-N.Y.; Vic Fazio, D-Calif.; Bill
Paxon, R-N.Y., and former House Minority Leader Robert Michel, R-Ill.,
all registered as lobbyists for the drug industry and worked on the
prescription drug bill.
"I can tell you that when the bill passed, there were better than 1,000
pharmaceutical lobbyists working on this," says Rep. John Dingell,
D-Mich.
Dingell has been in Congress for 52 years and is the new chairman of the
House Energy and Commerce Committee which shares jurisdiction over
Medicare. He says the bill would not have passed without the efforts of
the drug lobby.
"There is probably a lotta truth in it that the bill was stacked in
their benefit. And it's probably also true that it was written by their
lobbyists," he says.
Says Jones: "You couldn't even walk to the steps of the Capitol without
having somebody, maybe one or two, coming up to you to say, 'Can't you
change your vote? Can't you vote for this bill?' "
Why was the drug lobby was so interested in this bill and what did it
have to gain? Ron Pollack the executive director of Families USA, a
nonpartisan health care watchdog group, says it all boiled down to a key
provision in the legislation.
It prohibited Medicare and the federal government from using its vast
purchasing power to negotiate lower prices directly from the drug
companies.
"The key goal was to make sure there'd be no interference in the drug
companies' abilities to charge high prices and to continue to increase
those prices," says Pollack.
Pollack says there's no question that this was prompted by the
pharmaceutical lobby.
"They were the ones who wanted to make sure Medicare could charge high
prices and to continue to increase those prices," he said.
The drug industry says that competition among private insurance plans
that service the Medicare program help keep prices low. But Families USA
reported in a January study that Medicare patients are being charged
nearly 60 percent more for the top 20 drugs than veterans pay under a
program run by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
For example, Lipitor, a popular cholesterol drug, the cheapest Medicare
price is $785 for a years supply - 50 percent more than the VA's price
of $520.
For Zocor, another cholesterol drug, the best Medicare price is $1,485
for a years supply. The same drug only costs $127 a year under the VA's
plan.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Read the full Families USA report
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pollack says the VA successfully negotiates with the drug companies on
price.
"Medicare could do the same thing," he says, "but Medicare is prohibited
from doing that as a result of this new Medicare legislation."
"What was the logic? Or what was the idea, the rationale behind not
giving the government the ability to negotiate drug prices?" asks Kroft.
Burton says it was simply that the drug companies didn't want it.
"They wanted to make as much as money as possible. And if there's
negotiation, like there is in other countries around the world, then
they're gonna have their profit margin reduced," he says.
Before the vote, Congress was told the program would cost a whopping
$395 billion over the first 10 years. In fact, Medicare officials
already knew it was going to cost a lot more.
Burton said he and others were misled.
"Within two weeks after the bill was passed, everybody knew it was gonna
cost well over $500 billion," he says. "And many members of the Congress
[who] had voted for it said, 'I would never have voted for it had I
known that.' "
Medicare Chief Actuary Richard Foster later told Congress that he
revised the cost estimate to $534 before the vote, but was told to
withhold the new numbers if he wanted to keep his job.
During a Congressional hearing, Foster stated: "It struck me there was a
political basis for making that decision. I considered that
inappropriate and, in fact, unethical."
Foster said the person who told him to withhold Congress from getting
the revised estimates was Medicare boss Tom Scully.
Scully was the administration's lead negotiator on the prescription drug
bill, and at the time was also negotiating a job for himself with a
high-powered Washington law firm, where he became a lobbyist with the
pharmaceutical industry.
"He was negotiating for his job at the same time that the Medicare
legislation was being considered. He wound up taking this job 10 days
after the president signed this legislation," says Pollack.
It is but one example of the incestuous relationship between Congress
and the industry, and just one of the reasons the pharmaceutical lobby
almost never loses a political battle that affects its bottom line.
Former Congressman Billy Tauzin, who helped push the prescription drug
bill through the House, didn't disagree.
Has the bill been good for the drug industry?
"It's been good for the patients whom the drug industry represents ..."
Tauzin says. "In terms of profits - [for the drug companies] and
volumes, yes."
Says Kroft: "Your old friend, John Dingell, says that of the 1,500 bills
over the last 8 years dealing with pharmaceutical issues, the drug
companies almost, without exception, have gotten what they wanted."
"Yeah ... I would think he's correct. They've done fairly well," replies
Tauzin.
Why has this lobby been so successful? The former congressman says he
believes it's because they stood for the right things.
If Tauzin sounds a lot like a lobbyist for the drug industry, that's
because now he is.
Just a few months after the prescription drug bill passed, Tauzin began
discussions with the pharmaceutical industry to become its chief
lobbyist in Washington. He says it was one of several lucrative offers
he's received just before he got some very bad news.
"I got a call from a doctor in Bethesda who said, 'You got cancer. And
it's extremely rare. And it could kill ya.' And then everything
changed," Tauzin says.
Tauzin had a cancerous tumor removed from his intestines and was treated
with a new medicine, called Avastin, that had never been used before on
that form of cancer.
The treatment was successful, and as a result Tauzin says he felt he
owed his life to the drug industry. After serving out his congressional
term, he accepted a $2 million-a-year job dollar as president of PhRMA -
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.
"There was an extraordinary moment when my wife literally looked me in
the eye and said, 'Look, you're gonna do well wherever you go, Billy ...
You got a lot a great offers ... And maybe you oughta think about
working for the people that struggle everyday to try to invent the
medicines that save lives like yours.'
"And that was a pretty important moment in my life," Tauzin says. "And
it was the moment I decided that this was the work I wanted to do -
headaches and all."
Jones and Burton agree that the perception of Tauzin's move is not good.
"I mean, when you're pushing so hard for a bill that's controversial and
you have to keep the machine open for three hours to get the one vote
necessary to pass it, and then, within a matter of months you go to work
for the industry that's gonna benefit from it, it does cause you some
concern," says Burton.
They are not the only ones cynical about the decision.
"You push this bill through that produces a windfall for the drug
companies. And then a short time later, you go to work for the drug
lobby at a salary of $2 million. That doesn't look good," says Kroft.
"There was nothing I could've done in my life after leaving Congress
that wouldn't have had - I didn't have some impact on in 25 years in
Congress ... If that looks bad to you, have at it," Tauzin says. "That's
the truth."
In fairness to Tauzin and former Medicare chief Tom Scully, they weren't
the only public officials involved with the prescription drug bill who
later went to work for the pharmaceutical industry.
Just before the vote, Tauzin cited the people who had been most helpful
in getting it passed. Among them:
* John McManus, the staff director of the Ways and Means
subcommittee on Health. Within a few months, he left Congress and
started his own lobbying firm. Among his new clients was PhRMA, Pfizer,
Eli Lilly and Merck.
* Linda Fishman, from the majority side of the Finance Committee,
left to become a lobbyist with the drug manufacturer Amgen.
* Pat Morrisey, chief of staff of the Energy and Commerce
Committee, took a job lobbying for drug companies Novartis and
Hoffman-La Roche.
* Jeremy Allen went to Johnson and Johnson.
* Kathleen Weldon went to lobby for Biogen, a Bio-tech company.
* Jim Barnette left to lobby for Hoffman-La Roche.
In all, at least 15 congressional staffers, congressmen and federal
officials left to go to work for the pharmaceutical industry, whose
profits were increased by several billion dollars.
"I mean, they - they have unlimited resources. Unlimited," Burton says.
"And when they push real hard to get something accomplished in the
Congress of the United States, they can get it done."
In January, one of the first things the new Democratic House of
Representatives did was to make it mandatory for Medicare to negotiate
lower prices with the drug companies.
A similar measure faces stiff opposition in the Senate, where the drug
lobby is spending millions of dollars to defeat it. The president has
already announced that if the bill passes, he will veto it.
ml
Under The Influence
NEW YORK, April 1, 2007
CBS - 60 Minutes
If you have ever wondered why the cost of prescription drugs in the
United States are the highest in the world or why it's illegal to import
cheaper drugs from Canada or Mexico, you need look no further than the
pharmaceutical lobby and its influence in Washington, D.C.
According to a new report by the Center for Public Integrity,
congressmen are outnumbered two to one by lobbyists for an industry that
spends roughly a $100 million a year in campaign contributions and
lobbying expenses to protect its profits.
One reason those profits have exceeded Wall Street expectations is the
Medicare prescription drug bill. It was passed three-and-a-half years
ago, but as 60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft reports, its effects
are still reverberating through the halls of Congress, providing a
window into how the lobby works.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The unorthodox roll call on one of the most expensive bills ever placed
before the House of Representatives began in the middle of the night,
long after most people in Washington had switched off C-SPAN and gone to
sleep.
The only witnesses were congressional staffers, hundreds of lobbyists,
and U.S. Representatives like Dan Burton, R-Ind., and Walter Jones,
R-N.C.
"The pharmaceutical lobbyists wrote the bill," says Jones. "The bill was
over 1,000 pages. And it got to the members of the House that morning,
and we voted for it at about 3 a.m. in the morning."
Why did the vote finally take place at 3 a.m.?
"Well, I think a lot of the shenanigans that were going on that night,
they didn't want on national television in primetime," according to
Burton.
"I've been in politics for 22 years," says Jones, "and it was the
ugliest night I have ever seen in 22 years."
The legislation was the cornerstone of Republican's domestic agenda and
would extend limited prescription drugs coverage under Medicare to 41
million Americans, including 13 million who had never been covered
before.
At an estimated cost of just under $400 billion over 10 years, it was
the largest entitlement program in more than 40 years, and the debate
broke down along party lines.
But when it came time cast ballots, the Republican leadership discovered
that a number of key Republican congressmen had defected and joined the
Democrats, arguing that the bill was too expensive and a sellout to the
drug companies. Burton and Jones were among them.
"They're suppose to have 15 minutes to leave the voting machines open
and it was open for almost three hours," Burton explains. "The votes
were there to defeat the bill for two hours and 45 minutes and we had
leaders going around and gathering around individuals, trying to twist
their arms to get them to change their votes."
Jones says the arm-twisting was horrible.
"We had a good friend from Michigan, Nick Smith, and they threatened to
work against his son who wanted to run for his seat when he retired," he
recalls. "I saw a woman, a member of the House, a lady, crying when they
came around her, trying to get her to change her votes. It was -it was
ugly."
When the prescription drug bill finally passed shortly before dawn, in
the longest roll call in the history of the House of Representatives,
much of the credit went to former Congressman Billy Tauzin, R-La., who
steered it through the house.
"It's just a messy process," Tauzin says. "I mean, the old adage about
if you like sausage or laws, you should not watch either one of them
being made is true. It's a messy process."
Tauzin says that the voting machines were open for three hours "because
the vote wasn't finished."
As for arms being twisted? "People were being talked to," he says.
And of Walter Jones' comment that it was the "ugliest night" he had
"ever seen in politics in 22 years?"
"Well, he's a young member," counters Tauzin with a laugh. "Had he been
around for 25 years, he'd have seen some uglier nights."
It certainly wasn't ugly for the drug lobby which invested more than $10
million in campaign contributions during the last election and has been
a source of lucrative employment opportunities for congressmen when they
leave office.
Former senators Dennis Deconcini, D-Ariz., and Steve Symms, R-Idaho, and
former congressmen like Tom Downey, D-N.Y.; Vic Fazio, D-Calif.; Bill
Paxon, R-N.Y., and former House Minority Leader Robert Michel, R-Ill.,
all registered as lobbyists for the drug industry and worked on the
prescription drug bill.
"I can tell you that when the bill passed, there were better than 1,000
pharmaceutical lobbyists working on this," says Rep. John Dingell,
D-Mich.
Dingell has been in Congress for 52 years and is the new chairman of the
House Energy and Commerce Committee which shares jurisdiction over
Medicare. He says the bill would not have passed without the efforts of
the drug lobby.
"There is probably a lotta truth in it that the bill was stacked in
their benefit. And it's probably also true that it was written by their
lobbyists," he says.
Says Jones: "You couldn't even walk to the steps of the Capitol without
having somebody, maybe one or two, coming up to you to say, 'Can't you
change your vote? Can't you vote for this bill?' "
Why was the drug lobby was so interested in this bill and what did it
have to gain? Ron Pollack the executive director of Families USA, a
nonpartisan health care watchdog group, says it all boiled down to a key
provision in the legislation.
It prohibited Medicare and the federal government from using its vast
purchasing power to negotiate lower prices directly from the drug
companies.
"The key goal was to make sure there'd be no interference in the drug
companies' abilities to charge high prices and to continue to increase
those prices," says Pollack.
Pollack says there's no question that this was prompted by the
pharmaceutical lobby.
"They were the ones who wanted to make sure Medicare could charge high
prices and to continue to increase those prices," he said.
The drug industry says that competition among private insurance plans
that service the Medicare program help keep prices low. But Families USA
reported in a January study that Medicare patients are being charged
nearly 60 percent more for the top 20 drugs than veterans pay under a
program run by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
For example, Lipitor, a popular cholesterol drug, the cheapest Medicare
price is $785 for a years supply - 50 percent more than the VA's price
of $520.
For Zocor, another cholesterol drug, the best Medicare price is $1,485
for a years supply. The same drug only costs $127 a year under the VA's
plan.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Read the full Families USA report
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pollack says the VA successfully negotiates with the drug companies on
price.
"Medicare could do the same thing," he says, "but Medicare is prohibited
from doing that as a result of this new Medicare legislation."
"What was the logic? Or what was the idea, the rationale behind not
giving the government the ability to negotiate drug prices?" asks Kroft.
Burton says it was simply that the drug companies didn't want it.
"They wanted to make as much as money as possible. And if there's
negotiation, like there is in other countries around the world, then
they're gonna have their profit margin reduced," he says.
Before the vote, Congress was told the program would cost a whopping
$395 billion over the first 10 years. In fact, Medicare officials
already knew it was going to cost a lot more.
Burton said he and others were misled.
"Within two weeks after the bill was passed, everybody knew it was gonna
cost well over $500 billion," he says. "And many members of the Congress
[who] had voted for it said, 'I would never have voted for it had I
known that.' "
Medicare Chief Actuary Richard Foster later told Congress that he
revised the cost estimate to $534 before the vote, but was told to
withhold the new numbers if he wanted to keep his job.
During a Congressional hearing, Foster stated: "It struck me there was a
political basis for making that decision. I considered that
inappropriate and, in fact, unethical."
Foster said the person who told him to withhold Congress from getting
the revised estimates was Medicare boss Tom Scully.
Scully was the administration's lead negotiator on the prescription drug
bill, and at the time was also negotiating a job for himself with a
high-powered Washington law firm, where he became a lobbyist with the
pharmaceutical industry.
"He was negotiating for his job at the same time that the Medicare
legislation was being considered. He wound up taking this job 10 days
after the president signed this legislation," says Pollack.
It is but one example of the incestuous relationship between Congress
and the industry, and just one of the reasons the pharmaceutical lobby
almost never loses a political battle that affects its bottom line.
Former Congressman Billy Tauzin, who helped push the prescription drug
bill through the House, didn't disagree.
Has the bill been good for the drug industry?
"It's been good for the patients whom the drug industry represents ..."
Tauzin says. "In terms of profits - [for the drug companies] and
volumes, yes."
Says Kroft: "Your old friend, John Dingell, says that of the 1,500 bills
over the last 8 years dealing with pharmaceutical issues, the drug
companies almost, without exception, have gotten what they wanted."
"Yeah ... I would think he's correct. They've done fairly well," replies
Tauzin.
Why has this lobby been so successful? The former congressman says he
believes it's because they stood for the right things.
If Tauzin sounds a lot like a lobbyist for the drug industry, that's
because now he is.
Just a few months after the prescription drug bill passed, Tauzin began
discussions with the pharmaceutical industry to become its chief
lobbyist in Washington. He says it was one of several lucrative offers
he's received just before he got some very bad news.
"I got a call from a doctor in Bethesda who said, 'You got cancer. And
it's extremely rare. And it could kill ya.' And then everything
changed," Tauzin says.
Tauzin had a cancerous tumor removed from his intestines and was treated
with a new medicine, called Avastin, that had never been used before on
that form of cancer.
The treatment was successful, and as a result Tauzin says he felt he
owed his life to the drug industry. After serving out his congressional
term, he accepted a $2 million-a-year job dollar as president of PhRMA -
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.
"There was an extraordinary moment when my wife literally looked me in
the eye and said, 'Look, you're gonna do well wherever you go, Billy ...
You got a lot a great offers ... And maybe you oughta think about
working for the people that struggle everyday to try to invent the
medicines that save lives like yours.'
"And that was a pretty important moment in my life," Tauzin says. "And
it was the moment I decided that this was the work I wanted to do -
headaches and all."
Jones and Burton agree that the perception of Tauzin's move is not good.
"I mean, when you're pushing so hard for a bill that's controversial and
you have to keep the machine open for three hours to get the one vote
necessary to pass it, and then, within a matter of months you go to work
for the industry that's gonna benefit from it, it does cause you some
concern," says Burton.
They are not the only ones cynical about the decision.
"You push this bill through that produces a windfall for the drug
companies. And then a short time later, you go to work for the drug
lobby at a salary of $2 million. That doesn't look good," says Kroft.
"There was nothing I could've done in my life after leaving Congress
that wouldn't have had - I didn't have some impact on in 25 years in
Congress ... If that looks bad to you, have at it," Tauzin says. "That's
the truth."
In fairness to Tauzin and former Medicare chief Tom Scully, they weren't
the only public officials involved with the prescription drug bill who
later went to work for the pharmaceutical industry.
Just before the vote, Tauzin cited the people who had been most helpful
in getting it passed. Among them:
* John McManus, the staff director of the Ways and Means
subcommittee on Health. Within a few months, he left Congress and
started his own lobbying firm. Among his new clients was PhRMA, Pfizer,
Eli Lilly and Merck.
* Linda Fishman, from the majority side of the Finance Committee,
left to become a lobbyist with the drug manufacturer Amgen.
* Pat Morrisey, chief of staff of the Energy and Commerce
Committee, took a job lobbying for drug companies Novartis and
Hoffman-La Roche.
* Jeremy Allen went to Johnson and Johnson.
* Kathleen Weldon went to lobby for Biogen, a Bio-tech company.
* Jim Barnette left to lobby for Hoffman-La Roche.
In all, at least 15 congressional staffers, congressmen and federal
officials left to go to work for the pharmaceutical industry, whose
profits were increased by several billion dollars.
"I mean, they - they have unlimited resources. Unlimited," Burton says.
"And when they push real hard to get something accomplished in the
Congress of the United States, they can get it done."
In January, one of the first things the new Democratic House of
Representatives did was to make it mandatory for Medicare to negotiate
lower prices with the drug companies.
A similar measure faces stiff opposition in the Senate, where the drug
lobby is spending millions of dollars to defeat it. The president has
already announced that if the bill passes, he will veto it.
Internet and Health Fraud Team at FDA
http://www.fda.gov/Cder/Offices/DNDLC/hfimain.htm
Division of New Drugs and Labeling Compliance
Internet and Health Fraud Team
The Internet and Health Fraud Team is the focal point for fraudulentproducts. The IHF team also evaluates nontraditional and homeopathicproducts. The regulation of nontraditional drugs resulted indirectlyfrom a four-year Congressional review of the impact of quackery on theelderly. The report specifically identified ways that the agency canaddress Health Fraud issues in the United States.The purpose of the IHF team is to detect fraudulent drug products thatpose a health hazard to the public through deceptive and misleadingpromotions. These products include those that are likely to:Directly cause death, injury, or other serious adverse effects when usedas directed, andIndirectly cause harm to consumers who rely on an ineffective productwith exaggerated or false claims resulting in delay or discontinued useof appropriate medial treatment.The Health Fraud and Internet Team is Responsible for:Protect the public health by assuring compliance with the new drug adnmisbranding requirements of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act(FD&C Act).Prioritize unapproved new drugs identified for regulatory action usingrisk-based assessment and develop comlpiance strategies to address themost significant legal violations.Providing guidance to the Districts in headquarters-issued assignmentsand Drug Fraud Bulletins, and furnishing Districts with information andreports of surveillance concerning health fraud products.Consulting and advising the districts concerning surveillanceinvestigations and candidates for enforcement.Approving or disapproving regulatory sanctions and supporting litigationarising from this program.Maintaining contacts with other federal components to assure thatconsumers are properly advised about fraudulent products on the market.
Division of New Drugs and Labeling Compliance
Internet and Health Fraud Team
The Internet and Health Fraud Team is the focal point for fraudulentproducts. The IHF team also evaluates nontraditional and homeopathicproducts. The regulation of nontraditional drugs resulted indirectlyfrom a four-year Congressional review of the impact of quackery on theelderly. The report specifically identified ways that the agency canaddress Health Fraud issues in the United States.The purpose of the IHF team is to detect fraudulent drug products thatpose a health hazard to the public through deceptive and misleadingpromotions. These products include those that are likely to:Directly cause death, injury, or other serious adverse effects when usedas directed, andIndirectly cause harm to consumers who rely on an ineffective productwith exaggerated or false claims resulting in delay or discontinued useof appropriate medial treatment.The Health Fraud and Internet Team is Responsible for:Protect the public health by assuring compliance with the new drug adnmisbranding requirements of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act(FD&C Act).Prioritize unapproved new drugs identified for regulatory action usingrisk-based assessment and develop comlpiance strategies to address themost significant legal violations.Providing guidance to the Districts in headquarters-issued assignmentsand Drug Fraud Bulletins, and furnishing Districts with information andreports of surveillance concerning health fraud products.Consulting and advising the districts concerning surveillanceinvestigations and candidates for enforcement.Approving or disapproving regulatory sanctions and supporting litigationarising from this program.Maintaining contacts with other federal components to assure thatconsumers are properly advised about fraudulent products on the market.
ECSTASY MIMIC TABLETS IN OSAKA, JAPAN
February Microgram Bulletin from DEA:
http://www.dea.gov/programs/forensicsci/microgram/mg0207/mg0207.htmlECSTASY MIMIC TABLETS IN OSAKA, JAPAN(CONTAINING N-(2,4,6-TRIMETHYLPHENYL)-PHTHALIMIDE)
http://www.dea.gov/programs/forensicsci/microgram/mg0207/mg0207.htmlECSTASY MIMIC TABLETS IN OSAKA, JAPAN(CONTAINING N-(2,4,6-TRIMETHYLPHENYL)-PHTHALIMIDE)
Ecstasy really does unleash the love hormone
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11530-ecstasy-really-does-unleash-the-love-hormone.htm
Ecstasy really does unleash the love hormone
04 April 2007
NewScientist
Emma Young
Clubbers who take the "love drug" ecstasy really might be "loved up".Studies in rats suggest the drug causes a brain surge of oxytocin - thehormone that helps bond couples, as well as mothers to their babies.Earlier research found increased oxytocin in the blood of people who hadtaken ecstasy. However, many drugs increase blood oxytocin withoutraising it in the brain - something thought necessary for any"pro-social" effects.Iain McGregor at the University of Sydney in Australia, and hiscolleagues studied the effects of ecstasy in rats, which, like people,become more sociable on the drug. "It's very characteristic behaviour.They lie next to each other and chill out," McGregor says.The team gave the rats the equivalent of two to three ecstasy tablets inan adult human and found that the drug activated oxytocin-containingneurons in an area of their brains called the hypothalamus. When theygave the rats a drug that blocked brain receptors for oxytocin, theincreased sociability almost disappeared.Why it didn't disappear entirely isn't clear. It could be that the doseof the receptor blocker was too low, or that other brain chemicals, suchas dopamine, are also involved in triggering the sociable behaviour,McGregor says."Sensual, not sexual"The finding ties in with reports from people on ecstasy about how theyfeel, McGregor points out. Rodent studies have shown a massive surge ofoxytocin after orgasm in males. "It's interesting that guys on ecstasyfeel more sensual than sexual," McGregor says. "It could be that raisingoxytocin levels puts them in that sort of post-orgasmic state wherethey're actually not very good at performing sexually but they feelreally good about the person they're with."McGregor's team now plan to investigate the levels of oxytocin in rats'brains after they've taken MDMA, and to see which parts of the brain inparticular are affected.They suspect that the oxytocin release might be implicated not only inthe pro-social effects of ecstasy but also in the reinforcing effects.There is much research to be done on how drugs of abuse affect oxytocinin the brain, says McGregor. "What we know at the moment could bewritten on the back of a postage stamp."--------------http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=17383105&query_hl=2&itool=pubmed_docsumNeuroscience. 2007 Mar 22A role for oxytocin and 5-HT(1A) receptors in the prosocial effects of3,4 methylenedioxymethamphetamine ("ecstasy").Thompson MR, Callaghan PD, Hunt GE, Cornish JL, McGregor IS.The drug 3,4 methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA; ecstasy) has a widelydocumented ability to increase feelings of love and closeness towardothers. The present study investigated whether oxytocin, a neuropeptideinvolved in affiliative behavior, may play a role in this effect.A moderate (5 mg/kg, i.p.) dose of MDMA increased social interaction inmale Wistar rats, primarily by increasing the amount of time rats spentlying adjacent to each other.MDMA (5 mg/kg) activated oxytocin-containing neurons in the supraopticand paraventricular nuclei of the hypothalamus, as shown by Fosimmunohistochemistry.MDMA (5 mg/kg i.p.) also increased plasma oxytocin levels and thiseffect was prevented by pre-treatment with the 5-HT(1A) antagonist WAY100,635 (1 mg/kg i.p.).The oxytocin receptor antagonist tocinoic acid (20 mug, i.c.v.) had noeffect on social behavior when given alone but significantly attenuatedthe facilitation of social interaction produced by MDMA (5 mg/kg).The 5-HT(1A) agonist 8-hydroxy-2-(di-n-propylamino)-tetraline)(8-OH-DPAT, 0.25 mg/kg, i.p.) increased social behavior in a similar wayto MDMA and this effect was also significantly attenuated by tocinoicacid.Taken together, these results suggest that oxytocin release, stimulatedby MDMA through 5-HT(1A) receptors, may play a key role in the prosocialeffects of MDMA and underlie some of the reinforcing effects of thedrug.
Ecstasy really does unleash the love hormone
04 April 2007
NewScientist
Emma Young
Clubbers who take the "love drug" ecstasy really might be "loved up".Studies in rats suggest the drug causes a brain surge of oxytocin - thehormone that helps bond couples, as well as mothers to their babies.Earlier research found increased oxytocin in the blood of people who hadtaken ecstasy. However, many drugs increase blood oxytocin withoutraising it in the brain - something thought necessary for any"pro-social" effects.Iain McGregor at the University of Sydney in Australia, and hiscolleagues studied the effects of ecstasy in rats, which, like people,become more sociable on the drug. "It's very characteristic behaviour.They lie next to each other and chill out," McGregor says.The team gave the rats the equivalent of two to three ecstasy tablets inan adult human and found that the drug activated oxytocin-containingneurons in an area of their brains called the hypothalamus. When theygave the rats a drug that blocked brain receptors for oxytocin, theincreased sociability almost disappeared.Why it didn't disappear entirely isn't clear. It could be that the doseof the receptor blocker was too low, or that other brain chemicals, suchas dopamine, are also involved in triggering the sociable behaviour,McGregor says."Sensual, not sexual"The finding ties in with reports from people on ecstasy about how theyfeel, McGregor points out. Rodent studies have shown a massive surge ofoxytocin after orgasm in males. "It's interesting that guys on ecstasyfeel more sensual than sexual," McGregor says. "It could be that raisingoxytocin levels puts them in that sort of post-orgasmic state wherethey're actually not very good at performing sexually but they feelreally good about the person they're with."McGregor's team now plan to investigate the levels of oxytocin in rats'brains after they've taken MDMA, and to see which parts of the brain inparticular are affected.They suspect that the oxytocin release might be implicated not only inthe pro-social effects of ecstasy but also in the reinforcing effects.There is much research to be done on how drugs of abuse affect oxytocinin the brain, says McGregor. "What we know at the moment could bewritten on the back of a postage stamp."--------------http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=17383105&query_hl=2&itool=pubmed_docsumNeuroscience. 2007 Mar 22A role for oxytocin and 5-HT(1A) receptors in the prosocial effects of3,4 methylenedioxymethamphetamine ("ecstasy").Thompson MR, Callaghan PD, Hunt GE, Cornish JL, McGregor IS.The drug 3,4 methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA; ecstasy) has a widelydocumented ability to increase feelings of love and closeness towardothers. The present study investigated whether oxytocin, a neuropeptideinvolved in affiliative behavior, may play a role in this effect.A moderate (5 mg/kg, i.p.) dose of MDMA increased social interaction inmale Wistar rats, primarily by increasing the amount of time rats spentlying adjacent to each other.MDMA (5 mg/kg) activated oxytocin-containing neurons in the supraopticand paraventricular nuclei of the hypothalamus, as shown by Fosimmunohistochemistry.MDMA (5 mg/kg i.p.) also increased plasma oxytocin levels and thiseffect was prevented by pre-treatment with the 5-HT(1A) antagonist WAY100,635 (1 mg/kg i.p.).The oxytocin receptor antagonist tocinoic acid (20 mug, i.c.v.) had noeffect on social behavior when given alone but significantly attenuatedthe facilitation of social interaction produced by MDMA (5 mg/kg).The 5-HT(1A) agonist 8-hydroxy-2-(di-n-propylamino)-tetraline)(8-OH-DPAT, 0.25 mg/kg, i.p.) increased social behavior in a similar wayto MDMA and this effect was also significantly attenuated by tocinoicacid.Taken together, these results suggest that oxytocin release, stimulatedby MDMA through 5-HT(1A) receptors, may play a key role in the prosocialeffects of MDMA and underlie some of the reinforcing effects of thedrug.
Researchers tested pot, LSD on Army volunteers
Book site:http://www.forgottensecrets.net/
And interview with author by RU Sirius: http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/01/10/hallucinogenic-weapons-the-other-chemical-warfare/--------http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-04-05-army-experiments_N.htm?csp=34
Researchers tested pot, LSD on Army volunteers
By Richard Willing
USA TODAY
April 6, 2007
Army doctors gave soldier volunteers synthetic marijuana, LSD and twodozen other psychoactive drugs during experiments aimed at developingchemical weapons that could incapacitate enemy soldiers, a psychiatristwho performed the research says in a new memoir.The program, which ran at the Army's Edgewood, Md., arsenal from 1955until about 1972, concluded that counterculture staples such as acid andpot were either too unpredictable or too mellow to be useful as weapons,psychiatrist James Ketchum said in an interview.The program did yield one hallucinogenic weapon: softball-size artilleryrounds that were filled with powdered quinuclidinyl benzilate or BZ, adeliriant of the belladonnoid family that had placed some researchsubjects in a sleeplike state and left them impaired for days.Ketchum says the BZ bombs were stockpiled at an Army arsenal in Arkansasbut never deployed. They were later destroyed.The Army acknowledged the program's existence in 1975. Follow-up studiesby the Army in 1978 and the National Academy of Sciences in 1981 foundthat volunteers suffered no long-term effects.Insider's accountKetchum's book, Chemical Warfare: Secrets Almost Forgotten, appears tobe the first insider's account of experiments performed on about 2,000soldier volunteers, says Steven Aftergood, a government-secrecy expertfor the Federation of American Scientists in Washington, D.C. Ketchumself-published the book, which he sells on his website.In an interview, Ketchum, 75, said he wrote the book to trigger a debateabout the potential uses of non-lethal chemicals to incapacitateterrorists who take hostages or use human shields. "Incapacitatingagents are designed to save lives," he said. "Isn't it at leastsomething we should be thinking about?"Such research, says chemical weapons opponent Edward Hammond, would notonly be illegal under current international law but probably nevershould have been performed."There are things that have taken place in the past that should probablystay there," says Hammond, director of the Sunshine Project, an Austingroup that opposes biological warfare.Ketchum's memoir draws from previously classified files, includingfilmed experiments, and notes of tests given subjects before, during andafter they were fed, sprayed or injected with mind-altering chemicals.He says:*LSD was rejected for weapons use because even soldiers on prolongedtrips could carry out violent acts.*Even especially powerful marijuana lacked "knockdown effect." It wasrejected because its effects could be overcome simply by lying down andresting.*Soldier volunteers were willing participants who knew the program'spotential risks. Drugs given to soldiers were described in general termsbut not named though "many seemed to find out through the grapevine."*Intelligence reports of the time showed that Soviet researchers wereplanning a large-scale LSD program.*The CIA ran a parallel program that sometimes gave hallucinogenssecretly to unwitting citizens. The agency persuaded two Army doctors tocarry out experiments for the CIA that the Army would not haveauthorized.Ketchum says the Army phased out the hallucinogen project in about 1972,in part because disclosure of such research would have caused a "publicrelations problem."Ketchum's notes suggest the Army's fears were not imaginary. Theydescribe soldiers on "red oil," an especially powerful form ofmarijuana, who smirked for hours and found even routine spatialreasoning tests to be hilarious.Soldiers under the influence of hallucinogens ate imaginary chickens,took showers in full uniform while smoking cigars and chatted withinvisible people for two to three days at a time. One attempted to rideoff on an imaginary horse while another played with kittens only hecould see. Another described an order of toast as smelling "like aFrench whore."Some of the researchers also took LSD "as a matter of curiosity,"Ketchum says.His lone trip, he adds, was "something of an anti-climax." Colors seemedmore vivid and music more compelling, he remembers, but "there were nobreakthroughs in consciousness, no Timothy Leary stuff."At least two soldiers who received LSD in the 1950s later sued the Army,alleging that the drug later caused them to suffer memory loss,hallucinations and occasional outbursts of violence. The claims weredenied.After leaving the Army, Ketchum saw patients in a private psychiatricpractice.The experiments on human subjects ended in 1975, according to JeffSmart, historian for the Army's Research, Development and EngineeringCommand at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md.The United States signed a United Nations-sponsored chemical weapons banin 1993 that outlawed incapacitating agents.Calmative agentsEven so, the U.S. military has remained interested in researchingnon-lethal chemicals.In 2000, the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate, a Quantico, Va.,group run by all four major military branches, commissioned a study ofthe possible military uses of "calmative" pharmaceuticals such asanesthetics and serotonin reuptake inhibitors.The Sunshine Project's Hammond, who obtained the study through theFreedom of Information Act, says using calmatives as weapons would alsobe outlawed by the 1993 chemical weapons ban. Ketchum says that is notclear.In October 2002, Russian special forces used a calmative agent to subdueIslamist Chechen terrorists who were holding about 850 hostages in aMoscow theater. More than 120 hostages died from the drug's effects.
And interview with author by RU Sirius: http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/01/10/hallucinogenic-weapons-the-other-chemical-warfare/--------http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-04-05-army-experiments_N.htm?csp=34
Researchers tested pot, LSD on Army volunteers
By Richard Willing
USA TODAY
April 6, 2007
Army doctors gave soldier volunteers synthetic marijuana, LSD and twodozen other psychoactive drugs during experiments aimed at developingchemical weapons that could incapacitate enemy soldiers, a psychiatristwho performed the research says in a new memoir.The program, which ran at the Army's Edgewood, Md., arsenal from 1955until about 1972, concluded that counterculture staples such as acid andpot were either too unpredictable or too mellow to be useful as weapons,psychiatrist James Ketchum said in an interview.The program did yield one hallucinogenic weapon: softball-size artilleryrounds that were filled with powdered quinuclidinyl benzilate or BZ, adeliriant of the belladonnoid family that had placed some researchsubjects in a sleeplike state and left them impaired for days.Ketchum says the BZ bombs were stockpiled at an Army arsenal in Arkansasbut never deployed. They were later destroyed.The Army acknowledged the program's existence in 1975. Follow-up studiesby the Army in 1978 and the National Academy of Sciences in 1981 foundthat volunteers suffered no long-term effects.Insider's accountKetchum's book, Chemical Warfare: Secrets Almost Forgotten, appears tobe the first insider's account of experiments performed on about 2,000soldier volunteers, says Steven Aftergood, a government-secrecy expertfor the Federation of American Scientists in Washington, D.C. Ketchumself-published the book, which he sells on his website.In an interview, Ketchum, 75, said he wrote the book to trigger a debateabout the potential uses of non-lethal chemicals to incapacitateterrorists who take hostages or use human shields. "Incapacitatingagents are designed to save lives," he said. "Isn't it at leastsomething we should be thinking about?"Such research, says chemical weapons opponent Edward Hammond, would notonly be illegal under current international law but probably nevershould have been performed."There are things that have taken place in the past that should probablystay there," says Hammond, director of the Sunshine Project, an Austingroup that opposes biological warfare.Ketchum's memoir draws from previously classified files, includingfilmed experiments, and notes of tests given subjects before, during andafter they were fed, sprayed or injected with mind-altering chemicals.He says:*LSD was rejected for weapons use because even soldiers on prolongedtrips could carry out violent acts.*Even especially powerful marijuana lacked "knockdown effect." It wasrejected because its effects could be overcome simply by lying down andresting.*Soldier volunteers were willing participants who knew the program'spotential risks. Drugs given to soldiers were described in general termsbut not named though "many seemed to find out through the grapevine."*Intelligence reports of the time showed that Soviet researchers wereplanning a large-scale LSD program.*The CIA ran a parallel program that sometimes gave hallucinogenssecretly to unwitting citizens. The agency persuaded two Army doctors tocarry out experiments for the CIA that the Army would not haveauthorized.Ketchum says the Army phased out the hallucinogen project in about 1972,in part because disclosure of such research would have caused a "publicrelations problem."Ketchum's notes suggest the Army's fears were not imaginary. Theydescribe soldiers on "red oil," an especially powerful form ofmarijuana, who smirked for hours and found even routine spatialreasoning tests to be hilarious.Soldiers under the influence of hallucinogens ate imaginary chickens,took showers in full uniform while smoking cigars and chatted withinvisible people for two to three days at a time. One attempted to rideoff on an imaginary horse while another played with kittens only hecould see. Another described an order of toast as smelling "like aFrench whore."Some of the researchers also took LSD "as a matter of curiosity,"Ketchum says.His lone trip, he adds, was "something of an anti-climax." Colors seemedmore vivid and music more compelling, he remembers, but "there were nobreakthroughs in consciousness, no Timothy Leary stuff."At least two soldiers who received LSD in the 1950s later sued the Army,alleging that the drug later caused them to suffer memory loss,hallucinations and occasional outbursts of violence. The claims weredenied.After leaving the Army, Ketchum saw patients in a private psychiatricpractice.The experiments on human subjects ended in 1975, according to JeffSmart, historian for the Army's Research, Development and EngineeringCommand at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md.The United States signed a United Nations-sponsored chemical weapons banin 1993 that outlawed incapacitating agents.Calmative agentsEven so, the U.S. military has remained interested in researchingnon-lethal chemicals.In 2000, the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate, a Quantico, Va.,group run by all four major military branches, commissioned a study ofthe possible military uses of "calmative" pharmaceuticals such asanesthetics and serotonin reuptake inhibitors.The Sunshine Project's Hammond, who obtained the study through theFreedom of Information Act, says using calmatives as weapons would alsobe outlawed by the 1993 chemical weapons ban. Ketchum says that is notclear.In October 2002, Russian special forces used a calmative agent to subdueIslamist Chechen terrorists who were holding about 850 hostages in aMoscow theater. More than 120 hostages died from the drug's effects.
Sen. Biden: "Addiction is a Preventable, Treatable Disease"
March 29, 2007
Press Release-Sen. Biden: "Addiction is a Preventable, Treatable Disease"
Washington, DC - U.S. Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE), Chairman ofthe Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs has introducedlegislation to recognize addiction as a preventable and treatableneurobiological disease, and to better identify the roles and missionsof our research institutes.Sen. Biden's legislation (S. 1011) will change the name of NationalInstitute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to National Institute on Diseases ofAddiction, and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism(NIAAA) to the National Institute on Alcohol Disorders and Health."Addiction is a neurobiological disease - not a lifestyle choice - andlead by example and change the names of our Federal research institutes\u003cbr /\>to accurately reflect this reality. By changing the way we talk about\u003cbr /\>addiction, we change the way people think about addiction, both of which\u003cbr /\>are critical steps in getting past the social stigma too often\u003cbr /\>associated with the disease."\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>NIDA Name Change :\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Sen. Biden\'s legislation changes the National Institute on Drug Abuse to\u003cbr /\>the National Institute on Diseases of Addiction.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>The change has a dual purpose. First, it removes the pejorative term\u003cbr /\>"abuse" from the Institute\'s name and properly helps to distance that\u003cbr /\>notion from the disease of addiction. Second, the new name more clearly\u003cbr /\>links the concepts of addiction and disease, a connection that\u003cbr /\>scientific study clearly supports. Identifying addiction as a\u003cbr /\>neurobiological disease will diminish the social stigma, discrimination,\u003cbr /\>and personal shame that is often a barrier to seeking treatment, and it\u003cbr /\>will further a common understanding of diseases of addiction.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Despite the name change, NIDA\'s mission will remain the same. Like the\u003cbr /\>NIAAA, the NIDA was made an institute at the National Institutes of\u003cbr /\>Health in 1992 and it will continue bringing the power of science to\u003cbr /\>bear on drug use and addiction. It will also continue to pursue\u003cbr /\>cutting-edge research aimed at improving our national health and\u003cbr /\>well-being by reducing the profound burden of drug use and addiction on\u003cbr /\>individuals and society as a whole. In addition, NIDA will continue to\u003cbr /\>emphasize addiction as a preventable and treatable disease, working to\u003cbr /\>remove the stigma associated with addiction and to underscore that\u003cbr /\>diseases of addiction are critical national health issues.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>NIAAA Name Change:\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Senator Biden\'s legislation also changes the National Institute on\u003cbr /\>Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism to the National Institute on Alcohol\u003cbr /\>",1]);//-->it's about time we start treating it as such," said Sen. Biden. "We mustlead by example and change the names of our Federal research institutesto accurately reflect this reality. By changing the way we talk aboutaddiction, we change the way people think about addiction, both of whichare critical steps in getting past the social stigma too oftenassociated with the disease."NIDA Name Change :Sen. Biden's legislation changes the National Institute on Drug Abuse tothe National Institute on Diseases of Addiction.The change has a dual purpose. First, it removes the pejorative term"abuse" from the Institute's name and properly helps to distance thatnotion from the disease of addiction. Second, the new name more clearlylinks the concepts of addiction and disease, a connection thatscientific study clearly supports. Identifying addiction as aneurobiological disease will diminish the social stigma, discrimination,and personal shame that is often a barrier to seeking treatment, and itwill further a common understanding of diseases of addiction.Despite the name change, NIDA's mission will remain the same. Like theNIAAA, the NIDA was made an institute at the National Institutes ofHealth in 1992 and it will continue bringing the power of science tobear on drug use and addiction. It will also continue to pursuecutting-edge research aimed at improving our national health andwell-being by reducing the profound burden of drug use and addiction onindividuals and society as a whole. In addition, NIDA will continue toemphasize addiction as a preventable and treatable disease, working toremove the stigma associated with addiction and to underscore thatdiseases of addiction are critical national health issues.NIAAA Name Change:Senator Biden's legislation also changes the National Institute onAlcohol Abuse and Alcoholism to the National Institute on Alcoholinception as a component of the former Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental\u003cbr /\>Health Administration. At that time, almost all of the NIAAA\'s\u003cbr /\>responsibilities were to provide alcohol treatment and prevention\u003cbr /\>services.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>In the intervening years, Congress passed laws that strengthened NIAAA\'s\u003cbr /\>research responsibilities and transferred its non-research programs\u003cbr /\>elsewhere. NIAAA conducts and supports biomedical and behavioral\u003cbr /\>research with respect to the health, social, and economic consequences\u003cbr /\>of alcohol use. It also researches the prevention of alcohol abuse and\u003cbr /\>the treatment of alcoholism by, for example, performing genetic studies\u003cbr /\>and furthering medications development. The Institute\'s research also\u003cbr /\>focuses on the beneficial effects of moderate alcohol consumption for\u003cbr /\>some people as well as the negative effects of excessive alcohol use and\u003cbr /\>alcoholism. Finally, we now have data indicating that excessive alcohol\u003cbr /\>use and alcohol dependence (alcoholism) are not separate diagnostic\u003cbr /\>categories, but exist along a single continuum of alcohol-disorders\u003cbr /\>associated with increased frequency of a harmful drinking pattern.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Numerous addiction organizations support the name changes and both\u003cbr /\>institutes at the National Institutes of Health feel strongly that the\u003cbr /\>modifications are important. Indeed, the facts are self evident. The\u003cbr /\>2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health reported that addiction\u003cbr /\>affects 23.2 million Americans in our country, of whom only 10 percent\u003cbr /\>are receiving the treatment they need. Many are deterred even from\u003cbr /\>seeking such treatment, partly because of the social stigma associated\u003cbr /\>with admitting to a drug or alcohol dependency.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Senators Kennedy and Enzi, Chairman and Ranking Member of the Health,\u003cbr /\>Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, respectively, are cosponsors\u003cbr /\>of the bill.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>"This bill is a small but important step towards stripping away the\u003cbr /\>social stigma surrounding the treatment of diseases of addiction," said\u003cbr /\>Sen. Biden.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>\u003c/div\>",0]);//-->Disorders and Health. The previous name is a vestige of the Institute'sinception as a component of the former Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and MentalHealth Administration. At that time, almost all of the NIAAA'sresponsibilities were to provide alcohol treatment and preventionservices.In the intervening years, Congress passed laws that strengthened NIAAA'sresearch responsibilities and transferred its non-research programselsewhere. NIAAA conducts and supports biomedical and behavioralresearch with respect to the health, social, and economic consequencesof alcohol use. It also researches the prevention of alcohol abuse andthe treatment of alcoholism by, for example, performing genetic studiesand furthering medications development. The Institute's research alsofocuses on the beneficial effects of moderate alcohol consumption forsome people as well as the negative effects of excessive alcohol use andalcoholism. Finally, we now have data indicating that excessive alcoholuse and alcohol dependence (alcoholism) are not separate diagnosticcategories, but exist along a single continuum of alcohol-disordersassociated with increased frequency of a harmful drinking pattern.Numerous addiction organizations support the name changes and bothinstitutes at the National Institutes of Health feel strongly that themodifications are important. Indeed, the facts are self evident. The2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health reported that addictionaffects 23.2 million Americans in our country, of whom only 10 percentare receiving the treatment they need. Many are deterred even fromseeking such treatment, partly because of the social stigma associatedwith admitting to a drug or alcohol dependency.Senators Kennedy and Enzi, Chairman and Ranking Member of the Health,Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, respectively, are cosponsorsof the bill."This bill is a small but important step towards stripping away thesocial stigma surrounding the treatment of diseases of addiction," saidSen. Biden.
Press Release-Sen. Biden: "Addiction is a Preventable, Treatable Disease"
Washington, DC - U.S. Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE), Chairman ofthe Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs has introducedlegislation to recognize addiction as a preventable and treatableneurobiological disease, and to better identify the roles and missionsof our research institutes.Sen. Biden's legislation (S. 1011) will change the name of NationalInstitute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to National Institute on Diseases ofAddiction, and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism(NIAAA) to the National Institute on Alcohol Disorders and Health."Addiction is a neurobiological disease - not a lifestyle choice - andlead by example and change the names of our Federal research institutes\u003cbr /\>to accurately reflect this reality. By changing the way we talk about\u003cbr /\>addiction, we change the way people think about addiction, both of which\u003cbr /\>are critical steps in getting past the social stigma too often\u003cbr /\>associated with the disease."\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>NIDA Name Change :\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Sen. Biden\'s legislation changes the National Institute on Drug Abuse to\u003cbr /\>the National Institute on Diseases of Addiction.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>The change has a dual purpose. First, it removes the pejorative term\u003cbr /\>"abuse" from the Institute\'s name and properly helps to distance that\u003cbr /\>notion from the disease of addiction. Second, the new name more clearly\u003cbr /\>links the concepts of addiction and disease, a connection that\u003cbr /\>scientific study clearly supports. Identifying addiction as a\u003cbr /\>neurobiological disease will diminish the social stigma, discrimination,\u003cbr /\>and personal shame that is often a barrier to seeking treatment, and it\u003cbr /\>will further a common understanding of diseases of addiction.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Despite the name change, NIDA\'s mission will remain the same. Like the\u003cbr /\>NIAAA, the NIDA was made an institute at the National Institutes of\u003cbr /\>Health in 1992 and it will continue bringing the power of science to\u003cbr /\>bear on drug use and addiction. It will also continue to pursue\u003cbr /\>cutting-edge research aimed at improving our national health and\u003cbr /\>well-being by reducing the profound burden of drug use and addiction on\u003cbr /\>individuals and society as a whole. In addition, NIDA will continue to\u003cbr /\>emphasize addiction as a preventable and treatable disease, working to\u003cbr /\>remove the stigma associated with addiction and to underscore that\u003cbr /\>diseases of addiction are critical national health issues.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>NIAAA Name Change:\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Senator Biden\'s legislation also changes the National Institute on\u003cbr /\>Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism to the National Institute on Alcohol\u003cbr /\>",1]);//-->it's about time we start treating it as such," said Sen. Biden. "We mustlead by example and change the names of our Federal research institutesto accurately reflect this reality. By changing the way we talk aboutaddiction, we change the way people think about addiction, both of whichare critical steps in getting past the social stigma too oftenassociated with the disease."NIDA Name Change :Sen. Biden's legislation changes the National Institute on Drug Abuse tothe National Institute on Diseases of Addiction.The change has a dual purpose. First, it removes the pejorative term"abuse" from the Institute's name and properly helps to distance thatnotion from the disease of addiction. Second, the new name more clearlylinks the concepts of addiction and disease, a connection thatscientific study clearly supports. Identifying addiction as aneurobiological disease will diminish the social stigma, discrimination,and personal shame that is often a barrier to seeking treatment, and itwill further a common understanding of diseases of addiction.Despite the name change, NIDA's mission will remain the same. Like theNIAAA, the NIDA was made an institute at the National Institutes ofHealth in 1992 and it will continue bringing the power of science tobear on drug use and addiction. It will also continue to pursuecutting-edge research aimed at improving our national health andwell-being by reducing the profound burden of drug use and addiction onindividuals and society as a whole. In addition, NIDA will continue toemphasize addiction as a preventable and treatable disease, working toremove the stigma associated with addiction and to underscore thatdiseases of addiction are critical national health issues.NIAAA Name Change:Senator Biden's legislation also changes the National Institute onAlcohol Abuse and Alcoholism to the National Institute on Alcoholinception as a component of the former Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental\u003cbr /\>Health Administration. At that time, almost all of the NIAAA\'s\u003cbr /\>responsibilities were to provide alcohol treatment and prevention\u003cbr /\>services.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>In the intervening years, Congress passed laws that strengthened NIAAA\'s\u003cbr /\>research responsibilities and transferred its non-research programs\u003cbr /\>elsewhere. NIAAA conducts and supports biomedical and behavioral\u003cbr /\>research with respect to the health, social, and economic consequences\u003cbr /\>of alcohol use. It also researches the prevention of alcohol abuse and\u003cbr /\>the treatment of alcoholism by, for example, performing genetic studies\u003cbr /\>and furthering medications development. The Institute\'s research also\u003cbr /\>focuses on the beneficial effects of moderate alcohol consumption for\u003cbr /\>some people as well as the negative effects of excessive alcohol use and\u003cbr /\>alcoholism. Finally, we now have data indicating that excessive alcohol\u003cbr /\>use and alcohol dependence (alcoholism) are not separate diagnostic\u003cbr /\>categories, but exist along a single continuum of alcohol-disorders\u003cbr /\>associated with increased frequency of a harmful drinking pattern.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Numerous addiction organizations support the name changes and both\u003cbr /\>institutes at the National Institutes of Health feel strongly that the\u003cbr /\>modifications are important. Indeed, the facts are self evident. The\u003cbr /\>2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health reported that addiction\u003cbr /\>affects 23.2 million Americans in our country, of whom only 10 percent\u003cbr /\>are receiving the treatment they need. Many are deterred even from\u003cbr /\>seeking such treatment, partly because of the social stigma associated\u003cbr /\>with admitting to a drug or alcohol dependency.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>Senators Kennedy and Enzi, Chairman and Ranking Member of the Health,\u003cbr /\>Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, respectively, are cosponsors\u003cbr /\>of the bill.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>"This bill is a small but important step towards stripping away the\u003cbr /\>social stigma surrounding the treatment of diseases of addiction," said\u003cbr /\>Sen. Biden.\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>\u003cbr /\>\u003c/div\>",0]);//-->Disorders and Health. The previous name is a vestige of the Institute'sinception as a component of the former Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and MentalHealth Administration. At that time, almost all of the NIAAA'sresponsibilities were to provide alcohol treatment and preventionservices.In the intervening years, Congress passed laws that strengthened NIAAA'sresearch responsibilities and transferred its non-research programselsewhere. NIAAA conducts and supports biomedical and behavioralresearch with respect to the health, social, and economic consequencesof alcohol use. It also researches the prevention of alcohol abuse andthe treatment of alcoholism by, for example, performing genetic studiesand furthering medications development. The Institute's research alsofocuses on the beneficial effects of moderate alcohol consumption forsome people as well as the negative effects of excessive alcohol use andalcoholism. Finally, we now have data indicating that excessive alcoholuse and alcohol dependence (alcoholism) are not separate diagnosticcategories, but exist along a single continuum of alcohol-disordersassociated with increased frequency of a harmful drinking pattern.Numerous addiction organizations support the name changes and bothinstitutes at the National Institutes of Health feel strongly that themodifications are important. Indeed, the facts are self evident. The2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health reported that addictionaffects 23.2 million Americans in our country, of whom only 10 percentare receiving the treatment they need. Many are deterred even fromseeking such treatment, partly because of the social stigma associatedwith admitting to a drug or alcohol dependency.Senators Kennedy and Enzi, Chairman and Ranking Member of the Health,Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, respectively, are cosponsorsof the bill."This bill is a small but important step towards stripping away thesocial stigma surrounding the treatment of diseases of addiction," saidSen. Biden.
former Rep. Bob Barr (R-GA) is lobbying for MPP
Up in Smoke
Tory Newmyer and Kate Ackley
Roll Call Staff
March 28, 2007
Roll Call:Former Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.) was a major buzz kill when he was in Congress. Termed "the worst drug warrior" on Capitol Hill by the Libertarian Party, he led the charge among conservative Republicans against the drug legalization movement.Advocates for medical marijuana once blocked the door to his Congressional office in protest, and when he lost a primary race in 2001, the executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project called it "glorious news."So you might think you've smoked something to hear the latest: Barr just signed up to work for the marijuana lobby."You reach the point where you realize the federal government has become so big and so intrusive that it really forces you to take a look at a range of issues in a new light," Barr said in an interview.As of this month, Barr has signed a contract to lobby for the Marijuana Policy Project. That's the same group that once sued the government over the "Barr Amendment," a law that forbids D.C. residents from legalizing pot for medicinal purposes. Now, Barr said, he may be working to overturn it.The turn is the latest in Barr’s dramatic political evolution since leaving Congress. In the wake of disagreements with the GOP over privacy and spending issues, he quit the party and officially became a Libertarian in 2006. He has since built a platform as a political commentator, ringing the alarm about what he calls the "curtailment of personal liberties," and he founded an Atlanta-based lobbying and consulting firm called Liberty Strategies.\u003cbr\>Nobody seems more surprised about the new arrangement than the folks at the project. Aaron Houston, the group's top lobbyist, said Joe Seehusen, a former Libertarian Party director who once worked at the group, made the introduction. "He said, 'I've got a friend you should talk to, and you won't believe who it is,'" Houston said. "Obviously we're happy to have him with us, and we hope he'll set an example for some of his conservative colleagues."\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>So far, Barr is working with the group to pare back spending on an anti-drug advertising campaign he said "is not a wise use of federal money," and to forbid federal agents from conducting raids to enforce state drug laws.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>Barr said he has only conducted a few Hill visits so far, but “the couple Members I’ve spoken with have actually been very supportive.”\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003c/font\>\u003c/p\>\u003c/div\>\u003c/div\>",0]);D(["ce"]);//-->Nobody seems more surprised about the new arrangement than the folks at the project. Aaron Houston, the group's top lobbyist, said Joe Seehusen, a former Libertarian Party director who once worked at the group, made the introduction. "He said, 'I've got a friend you should talk to, and you won't believe who it is,'" Houston said. "Obviously we're happy to have him with us, and we hope he'll set an example for some of his conservative colleagues."So far, Barr is working with the group to pare back spending on an anti-drug advertising campaign he said "is not a wise use of federal money," and to forbid federal agents from conducting raids to enforce state drug laws.Barr said he has only conducted a few Hill visits so far, but “the couple Members I’ve spoken with have actually been very supportive.”
Tory Newmyer and Kate Ackley
Roll Call Staff
March 28, 2007
Roll Call:Former Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.) was a major buzz kill when he was in Congress. Termed "the worst drug warrior" on Capitol Hill by the Libertarian Party, he led the charge among conservative Republicans against the drug legalization movement.Advocates for medical marijuana once blocked the door to his Congressional office in protest, and when he lost a primary race in 2001, the executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project called it "glorious news."So you might think you've smoked something to hear the latest: Barr just signed up to work for the marijuana lobby."You reach the point where you realize the federal government has become so big and so intrusive that it really forces you to take a look at a range of issues in a new light," Barr said in an interview.As of this month, Barr has signed a contract to lobby for the Marijuana Policy Project. That's the same group that once sued the government over the "Barr Amendment," a law that forbids D.C. residents from legalizing pot for medicinal purposes. Now, Barr said, he may be working to overturn it.The turn is the latest in Barr’s dramatic political evolution since leaving Congress. In the wake of disagreements with the GOP over privacy and spending issues, he quit the party and officially became a Libertarian in 2006. He has since built a platform as a political commentator, ringing the alarm about what he calls the "curtailment of personal liberties," and he founded an Atlanta-based lobbying and consulting firm called Liberty Strategies.\u003cbr\>Nobody seems more surprised about the new arrangement than the folks at the project. Aaron Houston, the group's top lobbyist, said Joe Seehusen, a former Libertarian Party director who once worked at the group, made the introduction. "He said, 'I've got a friend you should talk to, and you won't believe who it is,'" Houston said. "Obviously we're happy to have him with us, and we hope he'll set an example for some of his conservative colleagues."\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>So far, Barr is working with the group to pare back spending on an anti-drug advertising campaign he said "is not a wise use of federal money," and to forbid federal agents from conducting raids to enforce state drug laws.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>Barr said he has only conducted a few Hill visits so far, but “the couple Members I’ve spoken with have actually been very supportive.”\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003c/font\>\u003c/p\>\u003c/div\>\u003c/div\>",0]);D(["ce"]);//-->Nobody seems more surprised about the new arrangement than the folks at the project. Aaron Houston, the group's top lobbyist, said Joe Seehusen, a former Libertarian Party director who once worked at the group, made the introduction. "He said, 'I've got a friend you should talk to, and you won't believe who it is,'" Houston said. "Obviously we're happy to have him with us, and we hope he'll set an example for some of his conservative colleagues."So far, Barr is working with the group to pare back spending on an anti-drug advertising campaign he said "is not a wise use of federal money," and to forbid federal agents from conducting raids to enforce state drug laws.Barr said he has only conducted a few Hill visits so far, but “the couple Members I’ve spoken with have actually been very supportive.”
History of cocaine self-administration alters morphine reinforcement in the rat
European Journal of Pharmacology
Volume 562, Issues 1-2 , 7 May 2007, Pages 77-81
History of cocaine self-administration alters morphine reinforcement in the rat
Pawel Mierzejewski, Roman Stefanski, Przemyslaw Bienkowski and Wojciech Kostowski
Abstract
It has been shown repeatedly that cocaine pre-exposure may sensitise neurochemical and behavioural responses to opioid drugs. The aim of the present study was to investigate effects of a prior history of cocaine self-administration on morphine reinforcement in the rat. Male Sprague–Dawley rats were allowed to acquire intravenous cocaine self-administration (0.3 mg/kg/infusion) for 20 days. When operant responding for cocaine had stabilised, morphine was introduced instead of cocaine in the next self-administration session. One group of cocaine-exposed rats was allowed to respond for 0.56 mg/kg/infusion of morphine (i.e. the dose which was willingly self-administered by drug-naive controls). The second group was allowed to respond for 0.056 mg/kg/infusion of morphine (i.e. the dose which did not maintain self-administration behaviour in the drug-naive rats). The subjects with the history of cocaine self-administration, in contrast to the drug-naive group, did not maintain operant responding for 0.56 mg/kg/infusion of morphine. These rats easily self-administered the ten times lower dose of the opioid (0.056 mg/kg/infusion). An opioid receptor antagonist, naltrexone (1 mg/kg i.p.) restored the positive reinforcing properties of the higher dose of morphine in the cocaine-exposed rats. Concluding, the present results suggest that prior history of cocaine self-administration sensitises rats to the positive reinforcing properties of morphine.
Volume 562, Issues 1-2 , 7 May 2007, Pages 77-81
History of cocaine self-administration alters morphine reinforcement in the rat
Pawel Mierzejewski, Roman Stefanski, Przemyslaw Bienkowski and Wojciech Kostowski
Abstract
It has been shown repeatedly that cocaine pre-exposure may sensitise neurochemical and behavioural responses to opioid drugs. The aim of the present study was to investigate effects of a prior history of cocaine self-administration on morphine reinforcement in the rat. Male Sprague–Dawley rats were allowed to acquire intravenous cocaine self-administration (0.3 mg/kg/infusion) for 20 days. When operant responding for cocaine had stabilised, morphine was introduced instead of cocaine in the next self-administration session. One group of cocaine-exposed rats was allowed to respond for 0.56 mg/kg/infusion of morphine (i.e. the dose which was willingly self-administered by drug-naive controls). The second group was allowed to respond for 0.056 mg/kg/infusion of morphine (i.e. the dose which did not maintain self-administration behaviour in the drug-naive rats). The subjects with the history of cocaine self-administration, in contrast to the drug-naive group, did not maintain operant responding for 0.56 mg/kg/infusion of morphine. These rats easily self-administered the ten times lower dose of the opioid (0.056 mg/kg/infusion). An opioid receptor antagonist, naltrexone (1 mg/kg i.p.) restored the positive reinforcing properties of the higher dose of morphine in the cocaine-exposed rats. Concluding, the present results suggest that prior history of cocaine self-administration sensitises rats to the positive reinforcing properties of morphine.
Is marijuana kosher for Pessah?
Is marijuana kosher for Pessah?
Sheera Claire Frenkel
THE JERUSALEM POST Mar. 27, 2007
Every Sunday school student knows Pessah for its ban on food that rises, but a growing number of Jews are asking whether the holiday also precludes them from getting high.Hemp has increasingly been spotted on the list of kitniyot, or legumes, that Ashkenazi Jews abstain from eating during Pessah, according to several influential rabbinical Web sites, including kashrut.com. But not everyone agrees that hemp qualifies for the ban, and the debate has led many to question the definition of kitniyot.While hemp isn't a kitchen staple for most people, hemp oil can be found in a number of hygiene products and in some alternative baked goods. But it's hemp's more notorious cousin, commonly known as marijuana, that has set the sparks flying. As debate over the kitniyot tradition has gathered steam among rabbinic circles, many are looking at hemp as a case in point of why the practice of abstention needs to be reexamined.The ban on kitniyot during Pessah began because rabbis were concerned that certain legumes would come into contact with the grains forbidden during the holiday. Farmers often grew wheat and rice in adjacent fields, and families frequently stored all of their grains and legumes in the same containers. The kitniyot tradition only applies to Jews of Ashkenazi descent, since Sephardic Jewry never adopted the practice.Of the dozen rabbis whom The Jerusalem Post questioned on this issue, none offered a conclusive statement about how hemp should be classified for Pessah. As Rabbi Daniel Kohn of Bat Ayin explained, the issue ultimately boils down to an individual decision by each rabbi about whether hemp seeds themselves could be considered edible. If a rabbi decides that the seeds are edible, then hemp - and, by extension, marijuana - would not be considered permissible for Pessah.Israel's Green Leaf Party ("Aleh Yarok") said it was not taking any chances. Following an inquiry by the Post, a spokeswoman for the party said the group was sending out an e-mail to members warning them about hemp's possible kashrut problems."We are warning our people not to eat anything with hemp products if they follow the practice of kitniyot on Pessah," said party spokeswoman Michelle Levine. "We are considering announcing a ban on everything containing hemp just to be on the safe side. We are going with the rabbis on this. People should remove all cannabis and hemp from their homes."Levine said one of the party's main arguments for cannabis legalization was biblical references to it."We would like to ask people... if it's listed as not kosher 'for Pessah,' [doesn't] that mean it must be kosher the rest of the year?" said Levine.Hemp's tricky Pessah status has caused the first marital rift for Daniel and Sarah, who recently moved to Jerusalem from Chicago. The newlyweds, who asked not to use their last name, said they had just finished their Pessah cleaning when a friend asked them if he could buy the rest of their marijuana."We just had no idea what he meant. It turns out he was buying it from a lot of his observant friends so that they wouldn't have it in the house, [like] hametz," said Sarah. "We aren't habitual users, but we certainly smoke in our house, and we really aren't sure what our pipe may have come in contact with. It has caused a big crisis for us."In the end, the two decided to quietly get rid of the rest of their marijuana (not by selling it to a friend, since it was kitniyot, and not hametz, they explained), and give their home one more cleaning before the holiday."There is no problem with hemp clothing, and of course, anything that is taken for medicinal purposes would be fine," said Kohn. "Many would look at it like cottonseed oil. There are a variety of opinions. If one considered it edible, then it is included in kitniyot."On Monday, the religious court of the Shilo Institute issued a ruling that permits all Jews to consume kitniyot during Pessah. Rabbi David Bar-Hayim wrote the ruling, with Rabbis Yehoshua Buch and Chaim Wasserman co-signing.The move is seen as a direct attack on the kitniyot tradition, as Bar-Hayim wrote that the current explanations for the custom were "unconvincing.""Kitniyot is no longer applicable. It's a tradition people keep going because they want to extend a perimeter so far outside the actual law of Torah that they could not possibly violate the actual law," said Dan Sieradski, an editor at JewSchool.com who has been at work on a book on Jews and drugs for several years."Clearly, you can use hemp in food," he said. "You might mix it into brownies. You aren't going to make bread out of it."
Sheera Claire Frenkel
THE JERUSALEM POST Mar. 27, 2007
Every Sunday school student knows Pessah for its ban on food that rises, but a growing number of Jews are asking whether the holiday also precludes them from getting high.Hemp has increasingly been spotted on the list of kitniyot, or legumes, that Ashkenazi Jews abstain from eating during Pessah, according to several influential rabbinical Web sites, including kashrut.com. But not everyone agrees that hemp qualifies for the ban, and the debate has led many to question the definition of kitniyot.While hemp isn't a kitchen staple for most people, hemp oil can be found in a number of hygiene products and in some alternative baked goods. But it's hemp's more notorious cousin, commonly known as marijuana, that has set the sparks flying. As debate over the kitniyot tradition has gathered steam among rabbinic circles, many are looking at hemp as a case in point of why the practice of abstention needs to be reexamined.The ban on kitniyot during Pessah began because rabbis were concerned that certain legumes would come into contact with the grains forbidden during the holiday. Farmers often grew wheat and rice in adjacent fields, and families frequently stored all of their grains and legumes in the same containers. The kitniyot tradition only applies to Jews of Ashkenazi descent, since Sephardic Jewry never adopted the practice.Of the dozen rabbis whom The Jerusalem Post questioned on this issue, none offered a conclusive statement about how hemp should be classified for Pessah. As Rabbi Daniel Kohn of Bat Ayin explained, the issue ultimately boils down to an individual decision by each rabbi about whether hemp seeds themselves could be considered edible. If a rabbi decides that the seeds are edible, then hemp - and, by extension, marijuana - would not be considered permissible for Pessah.Israel's Green Leaf Party ("Aleh Yarok") said it was not taking any chances. Following an inquiry by the Post, a spokeswoman for the party said the group was sending out an e-mail to members warning them about hemp's possible kashrut problems."We are warning our people not to eat anything with hemp products if they follow the practice of kitniyot on Pessah," said party spokeswoman Michelle Levine. "We are considering announcing a ban on everything containing hemp just to be on the safe side. We are going with the rabbis on this. People should remove all cannabis and hemp from their homes."Levine said one of the party's main arguments for cannabis legalization was biblical references to it."We would like to ask people... if it's listed as not kosher 'for Pessah,' [doesn't] that mean it must be kosher the rest of the year?" said Levine.Hemp's tricky Pessah status has caused the first marital rift for Daniel and Sarah, who recently moved to Jerusalem from Chicago. The newlyweds, who asked not to use their last name, said they had just finished their Pessah cleaning when a friend asked them if he could buy the rest of their marijuana."We just had no idea what he meant. It turns out he was buying it from a lot of his observant friends so that they wouldn't have it in the house, [like] hametz," said Sarah. "We aren't habitual users, but we certainly smoke in our house, and we really aren't sure what our pipe may have come in contact with. It has caused a big crisis for us."In the end, the two decided to quietly get rid of the rest of their marijuana (not by selling it to a friend, since it was kitniyot, and not hametz, they explained), and give their home one more cleaning before the holiday."There is no problem with hemp clothing, and of course, anything that is taken for medicinal purposes would be fine," said Kohn. "Many would look at it like cottonseed oil. There are a variety of opinions. If one considered it edible, then it is included in kitniyot."On Monday, the religious court of the Shilo Institute issued a ruling that permits all Jews to consume kitniyot during Pessah. Rabbi David Bar-Hayim wrote the ruling, with Rabbis Yehoshua Buch and Chaim Wasserman co-signing.The move is seen as a direct attack on the kitniyot tradition, as Bar-Hayim wrote that the current explanations for the custom were "unconvincing.""Kitniyot is no longer applicable. It's a tradition people keep going because they want to extend a perimeter so far outside the actual law of Torah that they could not possibly violate the actual law," said Dan Sieradski, an editor at JewSchool.com who has been at work on a book on Jews and drugs for several years."Clearly, you can use hemp in food," he said. "You might mix it into brownies. You aren't going to make bread out of it."
DEA: Flavored meth use on the rise
DEA: Flavored meth use on the rise
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-03-25-flavored-meth_N.htm
DEA: Flavored meth use on the rise
By Donna Leinwand,
USA TODAYMarch 26, 2007
Reports of candy-flavored methamphetamine are emerging around the nation, stirring concern among police and abuse prevention experts that drug dealers are marketing the drug to younger people.The flavored crystals are available in California, Nevada, Washington, Idaho, Texas, New Mexico, Missouri and Minnesota, according to intelligence gathered by Drug Enforcement Administration agents from informants, users, local police and drug counselors, DEA spokesman Steve Robertson says."Drug traffickers are trying to lure in new customers, no matter what their age, by making the meth seem less dangerous," Robertson says.Methamphetamine, a highly addictive stimulant, is usually a white or brownish, bitter-tasting crystalline powder that dissolves in water. It is usually smoked or snorted.Among the new flavors are strawberry, known as "Strawberry Quick," chocolate, cola and other sodas, Robertson said. One agent reported a red methamphetamine that had been marketed as a powdered form of an energy drink, he said.A patrol officer who stopped a car on Feb. 13 in a rural area of Greene County, Mo., seized a bag of "strawberry meth" from a female passenger, says Capt. Randy Gibson of the Greene County Sheriff's Department. The seized drug had a slight strawberry smell to it, he said.Greene County deputies have seized colored meth before, Gibson says. Several years ago, blue methamphetamine, known as "Smurf dope" circulated in the area, Gibson said."It was nothing more than one of the local meth cooks taking a great deal of pride in his purity," Gibson says. "He ground up blue chalk to color it so he could market it as his."Carson City, Nev., Undersheriff Steve Albertson says dealers often try to make their meth distinctive with color or a catchy name as a way to brand it. "Then they'll spread the word that this meth, whatever color it is, is the best kind of meth there is," he said.The appearance of "Strawberry Quick" in Greene County came less than two weeks after the Nevada Department of Public Safety issued a bulletin about flavored methamphetamine seized during a Jan 27 apartment search in Carson City."It seems to have progressed very quickly from west to east," Gibson says."Strawberry Quick," the bulletin said, "is popular among new users who snort it because the flavoring can cut down on the taste. Teenagers who have been taught meth is bad may see this flavored version as less harmful. 'Strawberry Quick' is designed for the younger crowd."As methamphetamine's popularity has waned, drug dealers have to create new ways to market it, says Scott Burns, deputy drug czar for state, local and tribal affairs for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. The number of people 12 and older who used methamphetamine for the first time in the previous year decreased from 318,000 people in 2004 to 192,000 people in 2005, according the National Survey on Drug Use and Health by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration."The traffickers know the word is out about what a horrible drug this is," Burns says."They are having a tough time selling this product, especially to young people. What do people in marketing do when they have a tough time selling a product? They have to come up with some sort of gimmick."
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-03-25-flavored-meth_N.htm
DEA: Flavored meth use on the rise
By Donna Leinwand,
USA TODAYMarch 26, 2007
Reports of candy-flavored methamphetamine are emerging around the nation, stirring concern among police and abuse prevention experts that drug dealers are marketing the drug to younger people.The flavored crystals are available in California, Nevada, Washington, Idaho, Texas, New Mexico, Missouri and Minnesota, according to intelligence gathered by Drug Enforcement Administration agents from informants, users, local police and drug counselors, DEA spokesman Steve Robertson says."Drug traffickers are trying to lure in new customers, no matter what their age, by making the meth seem less dangerous," Robertson says.Methamphetamine, a highly addictive stimulant, is usually a white or brownish, bitter-tasting crystalline powder that dissolves in water. It is usually smoked or snorted.Among the new flavors are strawberry, known as "Strawberry Quick," chocolate, cola and other sodas, Robertson said. One agent reported a red methamphetamine that had been marketed as a powdered form of an energy drink, he said.A patrol officer who stopped a car on Feb. 13 in a rural area of Greene County, Mo., seized a bag of "strawberry meth" from a female passenger, says Capt. Randy Gibson of the Greene County Sheriff's Department. The seized drug had a slight strawberry smell to it, he said.Greene County deputies have seized colored meth before, Gibson says. Several years ago, blue methamphetamine, known as "Smurf dope" circulated in the area, Gibson said."It was nothing more than one of the local meth cooks taking a great deal of pride in his purity," Gibson says. "He ground up blue chalk to color it so he could market it as his."Carson City, Nev., Undersheriff Steve Albertson says dealers often try to make their meth distinctive with color or a catchy name as a way to brand it. "Then they'll spread the word that this meth, whatever color it is, is the best kind of meth there is," he said.The appearance of "Strawberry Quick" in Greene County came less than two weeks after the Nevada Department of Public Safety issued a bulletin about flavored methamphetamine seized during a Jan 27 apartment search in Carson City."It seems to have progressed very quickly from west to east," Gibson says."Strawberry Quick," the bulletin said, "is popular among new users who snort it because the flavoring can cut down on the taste. Teenagers who have been taught meth is bad may see this flavored version as less harmful. 'Strawberry Quick' is designed for the younger crowd."As methamphetamine's popularity has waned, drug dealers have to create new ways to market it, says Scott Burns, deputy drug czar for state, local and tribal affairs for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. The number of people 12 and older who used methamphetamine for the first time in the previous year decreased from 318,000 people in 2004 to 192,000 people in 2005, according the National Survey on Drug Use and Health by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration."The traffickers know the word is out about what a horrible drug this is," Burns says."They are having a tough time selling this product, especially to young people. What do people in marketing do when they have a tough time selling a product? They have to come up with some sort of gimmick."
Abuse liability of buprenorphine–naloxone tablets in untreated IV drug users
Abuse liability of buprenorphine–naloxone tablets in untreated IV drug users
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T63-4M51FD5-2&_user=861681&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000046147&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=861681&md5=9dae849ea35c3c8cce7b86a9866fad27
Drug and Alcohol DependenceVolume 88, Issue 1 , 17 April 2007, Pages 75-78
Abuse liability of buprenorphine–naloxone tablets in untreated IV drug users
Hannu Alho, David Sinclair, Erkki Vuori and Antti Holopainen
Abstract
Buprenorphine (Subutex®) is widely abused in Finland. A combination of buprenorphine plus naloxone (Suboxone®) has been available since late 2004, permitting a comparison of the abuse of the two products among untreated intravenous (IV) users.A survey was distributed to attendees at a Helsinki needle exchange program over 2-weeks in April, 2005, At least 30% were returned anonymously.Survey variables included: years of prior IV opioid abuse, years of buprenorphine abuse, frequency, dosage, route of administration and reasons for use, concomitant IV abuse of other substances and amount paid on the street for both buprenorphine and buprenorphine + naloxone.Buprenorphine was the most frequently used IV drug for 73% of the respondents. More than 75% said they used IV buprenorphine to self-treat addiction or withdrawal.Most (68%) had tried the buprenorphine + naloxone combination IV, but 80% said they had a “bad” experience. Its street price was less than half that of buprenorphine alone.The buprenorphine + naloxone combination appears to be a feasible tool, along with easier access to addiction treatment, for decreasing IV abuse of buprenorphine.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T63-4M51FD5-2&_user=861681&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000046147&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=861681&md5=9dae849ea35c3c8cce7b86a9866fad27
Drug and Alcohol DependenceVolume 88, Issue 1 , 17 April 2007, Pages 75-78
Abuse liability of buprenorphine–naloxone tablets in untreated IV drug users
Hannu Alho, David Sinclair, Erkki Vuori and Antti Holopainen
Abstract
Buprenorphine (Subutex®) is widely abused in Finland. A combination of buprenorphine plus naloxone (Suboxone®) has been available since late 2004, permitting a comparison of the abuse of the two products among untreated intravenous (IV) users.A survey was distributed to attendees at a Helsinki needle exchange program over 2-weeks in April, 2005, At least 30% were returned anonymously.Survey variables included: years of prior IV opioid abuse, years of buprenorphine abuse, frequency, dosage, route of administration and reasons for use, concomitant IV abuse of other substances and amount paid on the street for both buprenorphine and buprenorphine + naloxone.Buprenorphine was the most frequently used IV drug for 73% of the respondents. More than 75% said they used IV buprenorphine to self-treat addiction or withdrawal.Most (68%) had tried the buprenorphine + naloxone combination IV, but 80% said they had a “bad” experience. Its street price was less than half that of buprenorphine alone.The buprenorphine + naloxone combination appears to be a feasible tool, along with easier access to addiction treatment, for decreasing IV abuse of buprenorphine.
Psychoactive drugs of misuse: rationalising the irrational
Psychoactive drugs of misuse: rationalising the irrational
Lancet Volume 369, Issue 9566 , 24 March 2007-30 March 2007, Page 972http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T1B-4N9XF65-7&_user=2052169&_coverDate=03%2F30%2F2007&_rdoc=7&_fmt=full&_orig=browse&_srch=doc-info(%23toc%234886%232007%23996300433%23646931%23FLA%23display%23Volume)&_cdi=4886&_sort=d&_docanchor=&_ct=38&_acct=C000046147&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=2052169&md5=428821527782ef2f08bd6e049eda9bb3CommentPsychoactive drugs of misuse: rationalising the irrationalWayne HallIdeally, policy responses to psychoactive drugs of misuse would take into account the variations in harm that each kind causes to users and the community. In today's Lancet, David Nutt and colleagues1 show that the UK classification of psychoactive drugs into three categories of harm (A, B, and C) is only modestly correlated with expert ratings of the harms caused. They also point out the obvious: the classification excludes the psychoactive drugs whose use causes the greatest harm—ie, alcohol and tobacco.2Nutt and colleagues asked UK experts in psychiatry, pharmacology, and addiction to rate drugs on three major dimensions of harm: physical health effects, potential for dependence, and social harms. The experts showed reasonable levels of agreement in their rankings. By contrast, their ratings were not well correlated with the UK classification, but the rank ordering was much the same as earlier rankings of drugs that took harms into\u003cbr\>The UK classification has been developed over nearly a century by small changing groups of experts. The information available to them on the harms that newer drugs cause has varied in quantity and quality, and, in the face of uncertainty, prudence has often led to drugs receiving the most risky classification, with limited opportunity to later revise these rankings.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>By contrast, Nutt and colleagues asked experts to compare the risks of various drugs (including alcohol and tobacco) on many dimensions of harm, gave the opportunity to revise ratings in the light of those of the group, and used statistics to derive overall rankings.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>Nonetheless, there remain major impediments to the adoption of policies that are better aligned with drug-related harms. Those who believe, for example, that legal penalties should be proportionate to the harm that drug use causes would argue that we should reduce penalties for use of the least harmful of the currently illicit drugs, among which cannabis would be the leading contender. The rankings also suggest the need for better regulation of the more harmful drugs that are currently legal (ie, tobacco and alcohol).\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>The wealthy, well organised, powerful, and politically connected alcohol and tobacco industries will be able to resist policies that would more effectively reduce the harms that their products cause. Several millennia of human experience with alcohol, its pervasiveness in industrialised cultures, and the US experience with alcohol prohibition (1920–32) make it unlikely that any industrialised society will criminalise alcohol use. But that still leaves plenty of room for more effective use of taxation and regulatory controls to reduce alcohol-related harm.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>Populism favours tough policies towards illicit drugs such as cannabis. Psychoactive drugs (other than alcohol and tobacco) remain the last holdout of the most restrictive form of regulation—criminal prohibition—despite the enthusiastic embrace of market deregulation almost everywhere else. This situation could change if the USA embraced a free market regime for all psychoactive drugs. But as attractive as this approach may be to libertarians, it would not be good public-health policy. Allowing a free market for all currently illicit drugs would add substantially to the harms now caused by alcohol and tobacco.",1]);//-->account.3 and 4The UK classification has been developed over nearly a century by small changing groups of experts. The information available to them on the harms that newer drugs cause has varied in quantity and quality, and, in the face of uncertainty, prudence has often led to drugs receiving the most risky classification, with limited opportunity to later revise these rankings.By contrast, Nutt and colleagues asked experts to compare the risks of various drugs (including alcohol and tobacco) on many dimensions of harm, gave the opportunity to revise ratings in the light of those of the group, and used statistics to derive overall rankings.Nonetheless, there remain major impediments to the adoption of policies that are better aligned with drug-related harms. Those who believe, for example, that legal penalties should be proportionate to the harm that drug use causes would argue that we should reduce penalties for use of the least harmful of the currently illicit drugs, among which cannabis would be the leading contender. The rankings also suggest the need for better regulation of the more harmful drugs that are currently legal (ie, tobacco and alcohol).The wealthy, well organised, powerful, and politically connected alcohol and tobacco industries will be able to resist policies that would more effectively reduce the harms that their products cause. Several millennia of human experience with alcohol, its pervasiveness in industrialised cultures, and the US experience with alcohol prohibition (1920–32) make it unlikely that any industrialised society will criminalise alcohol use. But that still leaves plenty of room for more effective use of taxation and regulatory controls to reduce alcohol-related harm.Populism favours tough policies towards illicit drugs such as cannabis. Psychoactive drugs (other than alcohol and tobacco) remain the last holdout of the most restrictive form of regulation—criminal prohibition—despite the enthusiastic embrace of market deregulation almost everywhere else. This situation could change if the USA embraced a free market regime for all psychoactive drugs. But as attractive as this approach may be to libertarians, it would not be good public-health policy. Allowing a free market for all currently illicit drugs would add substantially to the harms now caused by alcohol and tobacco.\u003cbr\>The work of Nutt and colleagues is a useful step towards a better evidence base for the formulation of drug policy. They challenge us to find ways to reduce the indefensible disparity between the regulatory treatment of alcohol and tobacco and the most widely used illicit drug, cannabis. The solution could involve a combination of increasing restrictions on the promotion and availability of alcohol and tobacco, while reducing the severity of the statutory penalties for cannabis users.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>More rational policies would also avoid thought-avoiding rhetoric such as the so-called war on drugs. Instead, we need to find better ways to reduce the demand for all psychoactive drugs by the youth of developed countries. And we need more humane and effective responses to people who become dependent on psychoactive drugs, despite our best efforts to discourage their use.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003c/font\>\u003c/p\>\u003c/div\>\u003c/div\>",0]);D(["ce"]);//-->The work of Nutt and colleagues is a useful step towards a better evidence base for the formulation of drug policy. They challenge us to find ways to reduce the indefensible disparity between the regulatory treatment of alcohol and tobacco and the most widely used illicit drug, cannabis. The solution could involve a combination of increasing restrictions on the promotion and availability of alcohol and tobacco, while reducing the severity of the statutory penalties for cannabis users.More rational policies would also avoid thought-avoiding rhetoric such as the so-called war on drugs. Instead, we need to find better ways to reduce the demand for all psychoactive drugs by the youth of developed countries. And we need more humane and effective responses to people who become dependent on psychoactive drugs, despite our best efforts to discourage their use.
Lancet Volume 369, Issue 9566 , 24 March 2007-30 March 2007, Page 972http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T1B-4N9XF65-7&_user=2052169&_coverDate=03%2F30%2F2007&_rdoc=7&_fmt=full&_orig=browse&_srch=doc-info(%23toc%234886%232007%23996300433%23646931%23FLA%23display%23Volume)&_cdi=4886&_sort=d&_docanchor=&_ct=38&_acct=C000046147&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=2052169&md5=428821527782ef2f08bd6e049eda9bb3CommentPsychoactive drugs of misuse: rationalising the irrationalWayne HallIdeally, policy responses to psychoactive drugs of misuse would take into account the variations in harm that each kind causes to users and the community. In today's Lancet, David Nutt and colleagues1 show that the UK classification of psychoactive drugs into three categories of harm (A, B, and C) is only modestly correlated with expert ratings of the harms caused. They also point out the obvious: the classification excludes the psychoactive drugs whose use causes the greatest harm—ie, alcohol and tobacco.2Nutt and colleagues asked UK experts in psychiatry, pharmacology, and addiction to rate drugs on three major dimensions of harm: physical health effects, potential for dependence, and social harms. The experts showed reasonable levels of agreement in their rankings. By contrast, their ratings were not well correlated with the UK classification, but the rank ordering was much the same as earlier rankings of drugs that took harms into\u003cbr\>The UK classification has been developed over nearly a century by small changing groups of experts. The information available to them on the harms that newer drugs cause has varied in quantity and quality, and, in the face of uncertainty, prudence has often led to drugs receiving the most risky classification, with limited opportunity to later revise these rankings.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>By contrast, Nutt and colleagues asked experts to compare the risks of various drugs (including alcohol and tobacco) on many dimensions of harm, gave the opportunity to revise ratings in the light of those of the group, and used statistics to derive overall rankings.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>Nonetheless, there remain major impediments to the adoption of policies that are better aligned with drug-related harms. Those who believe, for example, that legal penalties should be proportionate to the harm that drug use causes would argue that we should reduce penalties for use of the least harmful of the currently illicit drugs, among which cannabis would be the leading contender. The rankings also suggest the need for better regulation of the more harmful drugs that are currently legal (ie, tobacco and alcohol).\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>The wealthy, well organised, powerful, and politically connected alcohol and tobacco industries will be able to resist policies that would more effectively reduce the harms that their products cause. Several millennia of human experience with alcohol, its pervasiveness in industrialised cultures, and the US experience with alcohol prohibition (1920–32) make it unlikely that any industrialised society will criminalise alcohol use. But that still leaves plenty of room for more effective use of taxation and regulatory controls to reduce alcohol-related harm.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>Populism favours tough policies towards illicit drugs such as cannabis. Psychoactive drugs (other than alcohol and tobacco) remain the last holdout of the most restrictive form of regulation—criminal prohibition—despite the enthusiastic embrace of market deregulation almost everywhere else. This situation could change if the USA embraced a free market regime for all psychoactive drugs. But as attractive as this approach may be to libertarians, it would not be good public-health policy. Allowing a free market for all currently illicit drugs would add substantially to the harms now caused by alcohol and tobacco.",1]);//-->account.3 and 4The UK classification has been developed over nearly a century by small changing groups of experts. The information available to them on the harms that newer drugs cause has varied in quantity and quality, and, in the face of uncertainty, prudence has often led to drugs receiving the most risky classification, with limited opportunity to later revise these rankings.By contrast, Nutt and colleagues asked experts to compare the risks of various drugs (including alcohol and tobacco) on many dimensions of harm, gave the opportunity to revise ratings in the light of those of the group, and used statistics to derive overall rankings.Nonetheless, there remain major impediments to the adoption of policies that are better aligned with drug-related harms. Those who believe, for example, that legal penalties should be proportionate to the harm that drug use causes would argue that we should reduce penalties for use of the least harmful of the currently illicit drugs, among which cannabis would be the leading contender. The rankings also suggest the need for better regulation of the more harmful drugs that are currently legal (ie, tobacco and alcohol).The wealthy, well organised, powerful, and politically connected alcohol and tobacco industries will be able to resist policies that would more effectively reduce the harms that their products cause. Several millennia of human experience with alcohol, its pervasiveness in industrialised cultures, and the US experience with alcohol prohibition (1920–32) make it unlikely that any industrialised society will criminalise alcohol use. But that still leaves plenty of room for more effective use of taxation and regulatory controls to reduce alcohol-related harm.Populism favours tough policies towards illicit drugs such as cannabis. Psychoactive drugs (other than alcohol and tobacco) remain the last holdout of the most restrictive form of regulation—criminal prohibition—despite the enthusiastic embrace of market deregulation almost everywhere else. This situation could change if the USA embraced a free market regime for all psychoactive drugs. But as attractive as this approach may be to libertarians, it would not be good public-health policy. Allowing a free market for all currently illicit drugs would add substantially to the harms now caused by alcohol and tobacco.\u003cbr\>The work of Nutt and colleagues is a useful step towards a better evidence base for the formulation of drug policy. They challenge us to find ways to reduce the indefensible disparity between the regulatory treatment of alcohol and tobacco and the most widely used illicit drug, cannabis. The solution could involve a combination of increasing restrictions on the promotion and availability of alcohol and tobacco, while reducing the severity of the statutory penalties for cannabis users.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>More rational policies would also avoid thought-avoiding rhetoric such as the so-called war on drugs. Instead, we need to find better ways to reduce the demand for all psychoactive drugs by the youth of developed countries. And we need more humane and effective responses to people who become dependent on psychoactive drugs, despite our best efforts to discourage their use.\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003cbr\>\u003c/font\>\u003c/p\>\u003c/div\>\u003c/div\>",0]);D(["ce"]);//-->The work of Nutt and colleagues is a useful step towards a better evidence base for the formulation of drug policy. They challenge us to find ways to reduce the indefensible disparity between the regulatory treatment of alcohol and tobacco and the most widely used illicit drug, cannabis. The solution could involve a combination of increasing restrictions on the promotion and availability of alcohol and tobacco, while reducing the severity of the statutory penalties for cannabis users.More rational policies would also avoid thought-avoiding rhetoric such as the so-called war on drugs. Instead, we need to find better ways to reduce the demand for all psychoactive drugs by the youth of developed countries. And we need more humane and effective responses to people who become dependent on psychoactive drugs, despite our best efforts to discourage their use.
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