The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) targeted grants of $500,000 a year for five years to both Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, and the University of Connecticut. Dr. Thomas Kosten is leading the Baylor team to find a vaccine for methamphetamine, and Dr. Peter Burkhard’s team in Connecticut is working on one for nicotine.

NIDA estimates that 22 million Americans are abusing drugs, and that addiction costs the United States $84 billion in lost earnings, crime, health care expenses, and accidents. The hope is that young people could actually be vaccinated against addiction, and that current addicts could use vaccines to reverse their conditions.

Vaccines for various drug addictions all work in the same way. The theory is that small molecules, such as cocaine molecules, can easily enter the bloodstream. If these tiny molecules bind to large protein molecules, the human immune system will attack them and eventually break them down.

“It’s like a big sponge for cocaine,” Dr. Kosten said. “The drug remains trapped in the blood until it is metabolized and made inactive by the liver and secreted in the kidneys.”

As early as 1970, researchers at the University of Chicago tried to develop a vaccine against heroin addiction. The vaccine worked successfully on monkeys, but not with humans. Dr. Kim Janda from the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, produced a vaccine against heroin that had also worked in rats that would stop seeking the drug after they received the vaccine. However, it worked no better than a placebo on human subjects. Vaccines for cocaine, methamphetamine, and marijuana, developed at Columbia University in New York in 2010, were effective on humans only 38% to 67% of the time; and even among those subjects who showed improvement, results were mixed.

“The big problem plaguing these vaccines right now is difficulty predicting in humans how well it’s going to work,” Dr. Janda said.

Dr. Burkhard’s team will spend 18 months developing the nicotine vaccine, one year manufacturing it, and more than two years in clinical trials.

“Our greatest challenge is generating as strong an immune response as possible to induce the effect we are looking for,” he said. The idea has been around for a while … and it only works if you have really high levels of antibodies. Most of the clinical trials failed for this reason, because they were only able to induce anti-bodies in 30% of the population, and that is simply not good enough.”

Dr. Burkhard noted that seven million people die from smoking every year, which is the equivalent of the entire population of Switzerland.

“It is a tremendous step forward to have a vaccine to prevent smoking, not only for the seven million who die but also for the countless millions who are living with their smoking addiction,” he said.

Dr. Nora Volkow, director of NIDA, said the group’s goal is “to support investigators of exceptional creativity who propose bold and highly innovative, new research approaches that have the potential to produce a major impact on the treatment of drug abuse. … Vaccines have a unique role to play in a comprehensive strategy to help people overcome addictions. A successful vaccine will make it easier for addicted individuals to establish and maintain abstinence.”

Researchers Seek Vaccines to Stop Drug Addiction is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) issues regular reports about various aspects of substance abuse and treatment availability. The data issued by SAMHSA are useful for policymakers as well as those who work in substance abuse treatment and prevention for determining the needs of the population. A recent report from SAMHSA detailed the length of time between an adult’s first time using a substance and when they sought admission for drug treatment.

SAMHSA’s recent report focused on admissions from 2009. In that year there were 1.8 million admissions over the age of 18, with 36.9 percent of those admissions reporting their treatment as their first time seeking help for substance abuse.

The report found that the average age of first use was 18.4 years. The average age at which the individuals sought treatment was 34 years. This indicates an average of 15.6 years of substance use before receiving treatment. Females were associated with a shorter duration of use than males (13.8 years versus 16.5 years).

Duration of use varied among the different primary substance of abuse. Alcohol use represented the longest duration of use with an average of 20.2 years between the first time the substance was tried and beginning of alcohol treatment. For those who use cocaine, heroin, marijuana and stimulants, the duration of use was between 12 and 14 years. The primary drug of use that showed the shortest duration was prescription drugs, with an average of 7.8 years.

The duration of use also varied by race or ethnicity and gender. Among those who reported alcohol as their primary substance of abuse, the average duration between first use and treatment ranged from 22 years for non-Hispanic blacks to 16.4 years for Asians/Pacific Islanders.

The data provided by SAMHSA may help policymakers better plan for drug treatment facilities. It will also help those who attempt to screen populations for substance abuse in determining how to approach education efforts.

The Gap Between First Use and Getting Help is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

Although physicians and addiction experts have been referring to addiction as a chronic disorder—and backed up by a sufficient body of scientific evidence—for several years now, this is the first time ASAM has taken an official stance regarding addiction as a chronic brain disease, hoping it will generate more public awareness among both the general population and the medical community. Following a four-year investigation involving more than 80 field experts, the entire ASAM board and its chapter presidents, and a review of twenty years worth of neuroscientific developments, ASAM found it necessary to bring the definition up to date with today’s clinical understanding of addiction. Under the new criteria, addiction is not just a social, behavioral, or moral problem, according to former ASAM president Dr. Michael Miller—but is rather categorized as a primary chronic condition that, not dissimilar to cardiovascular disease or diabetes, requires lifelong treatment and management.

ASAM’s long definition of addiction, available on the society’s website (http://www.asam.org/DefinitionofAddiction-LongVersion.html), explains how addiction is much more than just poor decision making and behavioral choices involving excess drinking, smoking, other recreational drugs, gambling, or sex. ASAM hopes that the new definition will take the focus off drugs and onto the brain when dealing with addictive disorders. Addictions are often pigeonholed by the public’s common assumption that they are the result of dysfunctional personalities or mental problems, making addiction sufferers feel stigmatized and hesitant to seek help for their conditions. Yet the substance abuse and compulsive behavior are not the root of the problem, but rather manifestations of a more complex brain disorder that affects multiple regions of the brain. Addiction causes these regions to undergo various changes like dysfunctional neurotransmission, resulting in altered behavior and decisions that may be considered otherwise uncharacteristic of the individual, and can worsen over time. Just like any other chronic condition, addiction needs to be better understood by the public so everyone recognizes the crucial need to seek treatment and prevent future threats to health. Addiction presents all the criteria for a chronic disease, including exhibiting signs and symptoms, necessitating medical intervention and monitoring, requiring lifelong adherence, and (if untreated) can pose as a serious risk for lifelong deficits or death.

In basic terms, addiction is a disease, not a choice. The chronic disease causes an addict’s judgment, control, feelings, and perceptions to become rewired by continual dysfunctions in the brain’s reward system, which may leave them feeling powerless to their addictions. However, the ASAM advisors stress that people with addictions still do have a conscious choice: to seek treatment for their conditions. Because addiction can lead to unhealthy lifestyles, poor decision making, and other added risks, making the choice to seek recovery and treatment is the best way to overcome the primary cause of all these symptoms and achieve a more healthful quality of life.

With the confirmation of the new definition, ASAM seeks to help remove the stigmatization of addiction and offer better opportunities for individuals and their family members to gain access to treatment and resources. ASAM’s original press release can be viewed here: http://www.asam.org/pdf/Advocacy/PressReleases/20110815_DefofAddiction-PR.pdf.

Addiction Is a Chronic Brain Disease, Not Just Problem Behavior is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

Dr. Kim D. Janda, Chemistry Chair at Scripps, says the treatment has shown to be effective in the immune response in the tested animals. They hope it will be an effective option for those trying to stop their heroin addiction, according to a recent report published in Science Daily. For the past 40 years researchers have not been able to achieve a viable vaccine for heroin as it is a mysterious drug that metabolizes into multiple matters.

Heroin has long been an epidemic of such a destructive nature, costing the U.S. $22 billion annually due to criminal problems, medical bills, loss of workforce productivity, and welfare costs. Researchers at Scripps say that heroin addiction and heroin abuse are huge factors in the spread of the AIDS virus because of users sharing needles.

Their newest approach is dynamic enough to not only targeting the heroin, but also the other chemicals that it breaks itself down into, known as 6AM. Researchers say they have come up with a sort of heroin cocktail that is a mixture of proteins that gradually break down in the system and expose it to different metabolites that are psychoactive to heroin.

Results in rat studies are promising and the team says they have never seen as dramatic a response to an experiment of this type.

Anti-Heroin Vaccine May Soon Be Available to Heroin Addicts is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

During testing, drugs, such as heroin and opium both activate the hypothalamus just as salt does. Scientists are led to believe that such addicting drugs have found a way to seize and take over some instinctive performance and behaviors. While the connection currently only exists in a theory, Australian professors are hoping to make it a proven fact.

Until it can be proven, researchers have turned to mice in hopes of making a theory a reality. Scientists didn’t allow a certain number of mice to eat salt, and instead, fed them a very low sodium diet. Days after the diet change, the mice were taken and analyzed. It was found that the mice who ate the salt had activated the same gene patterns that were changed in those addicted to cocaine and opium. The mice that were allowed to have absolutely no salt were also allowed saline solution as their “fix”. In their results, it was shown that there was a change in the genetic make up of expression, in the brain.

With these new studies, scientist and treatment facilities are also looking at a new way to treat the addiction. Now that they understand the area of the brain where the damage is being done, there might be hope for a new approach to treatment.

A world salt metabolism authority, informed researchers that the cocaine and opium addiction has developed gradually over the past couple thousand years. It was also shared that salt is considered a basic need of survival because the body uses it to circulate tissue and blood fluid’s functionality of the nerves, glandular and muscles. It is also extremely important in reproduction.

With all of the research and findings, it is suggested that addicting drugs, like cocaine and opium, have learned to take control of neural pathways that help to further the appetite for sodium and the satisfaction of sodium intake. The research also found that the saline solution gave the brain the idea that it got its fix, even though it was impossible. Before salt even entered the blood circulation, the brain thought it was repaired. This is because salt is needed for survival and is something that has evolved with evolution.

The Australian research team was comprised of Professor Denton and associates Michael McKinley, Andrew Lawrence, John Drago and Lesley Walker of Florey Neuroscience Institutes and Baker Medical Research Institute. The United States research team consisted of scientists from the University of Texas, as well as Duke University.

The Salt and Heroin Correlation is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

The research team from the University of Illinois said that the structures and pathways through which chemical reactions happen in fruit flies are close to those of many living things, including people. The systemic impact of methamphetamine can be studied because the fruit flies systems are so compact, according to a Medical News Today report.

The impac of meth on the fruit flies’ systems have proven to be vast and surprising. The way the flies generate energy, process sugar, form reproductive cells, and the way their muscles relate to skeleton and respiration are all affected by meth. In addition, unexpected breaks and interruptions in processes at the cell levels were noted, as well as unanticipated impacts on molecular structures.

One of the most impactful findings include researchers’ observations that meth impacts the energy metabolism function in cells in a similar way as cancer modifies cells as it grows. They hope that by learning more about this process, they can learn more about how cancer attacks and damages cells.

Sugar is also a key element of the research. Meth addicts often crave sugar when they are "high," and researchers discovered that the fruit flies who were exposed to meth extended their lives when they were given trehalose, an insect type of blood sugar.

As the work continues, the team believes fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster) offer tremendous potential to understand how meth affects the body, as well as to open doors to other types of human health research.

Fruit Flies Reveal Surprising Findings About Impact of Meth on Human Body is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

For the study, the researchers performed a neuropsychological evaluation with 123 polysybstance abusers (those who abuse different types of drugs) and 67 non-drug users from similar social and demographic backgrounds. The polysubstance abusers mostly abused cocaine, marijuana, heroin, alcohol, MDMA, and methamphetamine, and were enrolled in two drug rehab programs (Proyecto Hombre and Cortijo Buenos Aires) in Granada.

The study found that 70 percent of drug abusers had some type of neuropsychological deterioration, regardless of the type of drug they used. Deterioration was found in working memory, fluency, flexibility, planning, multitasking, and interference.

This study is the first to study psychological deterioration in drug abusers who are enrolled in drug rehabilitation programs. Although previous studies have looked at emotional recognition by drug users, those studies focused on recognition as a unit process. The current study analyzed the relation between drug abuse and recognition of basic emotions such as happiness, fear, sadness, and surprise.

Lead author María José Fernández Serrano, along with professors Miguel Pérez García and Antonio Javier Verdejo García, of the Department of Personality and Psychological Treatment and Evaluation at the University of Granada, said she thinks that the study’s results could help develop policies aimed at promoting drug rehab programs that have been adapted to the neuropsychological profile of drug abusers.

Source: Science Daily, Drug-Abusers Have Difficulty to Recognize Negative Emotions as Wrath, Fear and Sadness, Study Finds, February 3, 2011

Study Finds Psychological Deterioration in Drug Abusers is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

The researchers found the mutations in more than 40 percent of autopsy brain samples taken from white people who had died of a cocaine overdose. Of white people who didn’t use drugs, only 19 percent had the mutation. One in five samples from the drug-free group had the variant, compared with one in two to three samples from the cocaine-using white individuals and one in eight African Americans. (The gene variant is less prevalent in African Americans.)

The study found that the mutations affect the way in which the brain reacts to the neurotransmitter dopamine (which is released in the brain after certain activities, including using cocaine). Previous studies have shown that cocaine blocks dopamine transmitters from absorbing dopamine after it is released in the brain, which leads to a feeling of euphoria that the brain eventually associates with cocaine and causes drug cravings.

This is the first study to find a strong connection in brain tissue between the mutations and severe cocaine abuse. However, many questions remain, such as whether the mutations increase the risk of someone trying cocaine in the first place, or whether they strengthen the brain’s drug craving, which leads to severe abuse.

Wolfgang Sadee, senior author of the study and a professor of pharmacology and director of the Program in Pharmacogenomics at Ohio State University, said that their study shows that the gene mutations may impact cocaine abuse, and could help researchers discover new therapies for a range of psychiatric disorders that involve dopamine.

No test currently exists to see whether people are carrying the mutations. Sadee and colleagues are currently examining how these mutations could affect the response of carriers to drugs that act on the gene.

Source: Science Daily, Genetic Trait Could Triple Odds of Whites’ Susceptibility to Heavy Cocaine Abuse, September 22, 2010

Genetic Variant Increases Risk of Severe Cocaine Abuse in Whites is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

Led by Pierluigi Nicotera, scientific director of the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE), a team of researchers from Germany, the UK, and Italy have discovered a molecular switch that is associated with establishing addictive behavior and memory processes. The findings could help scientist develop treatments for memory loss and addiction.

Neurotransmitters help neuronal signals pass from one nerve cell to the next; this is a the first step for any learning process, and sets into motion a sequence of events that lead to changes in neuronal connectivity and memory. Substances like nicotine and cocaine can also trigger this change in brain connections.

Nueronal plasticity, or the formation of new connections in the brain, involves calcium. In response to neurotransmitters, nicotine, or cocaine, the brain creates more calcium at the synapse, where the neuronal connection takes place. The increased calcium induces gene expression, or the synthesis of proteins that lead to new synaptic connectivity. Although it has been generally accepted that the increase in calcium is only part of the first step in this process and does not depend on gene expression, Nicotera and colleagues are challenging this idea.

The new study shows that gene expression involved in calcium signaling is required to induce plasticity in nerve cells after repeated exposure to nicotine or cocaine. After giving nicotine to mice, they found that the nicotine induced the expression of a gene called type 2 ryanodine receptor (RyR2), which is associated with releasing calcium from the endoplasmic reticulum, leading to neuronal plasticity.

RyR2 is expressed in several brain regions that are associated with cognition and addiction, suggesting that it plays an important role in these processes. In another experiment, the researchers confirmed this theory by demonstrating that reducing RyR2 in living animals alters behaviors associated with learning, memory, and addiction. This suggests that RyR2 is necessary for developing long-term changes in the brain that can lead to addiction.

The researchers hope that these findings could help develop more efficient treatments for both memory loss and addiction.

Source: Science Daily, A Molecular Switch for Memory and Addiction, November 26, 2010

Researchers Discover Memory Switch That Plays Role in Memory and Addiction is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

The study, published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, was conducted by Mildred M. Maldonado-Molina, Ph.D., and Alexander C. Wagenaar, Ph.D., of the Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research, University of Florida, College of Medicine, Gainesville.

The researchers examined non-alcoholic deaths in Florida and other states’ rates of alcohol-related deaths using data from the US National Vital Statistics System of the National Center for Health Statistics. The data is based on information provided by physicians on individual death certificates.

Over the 36-year period, they observed 432 deaths per month in Florida. Through the study, they estimate that a 10 percent increase in tax would lead to a 22 percent decline in alcohol-related deaths. The study did not include deaths from alcohol-related accidents, crime, or violence.

Maldonado-Molina said that their study shows that raising taxes on alcohol can affect the death rate from cirrhosis of the liver, pancreatitis, gastric diseases, certain cancers, and cardiovascular disease.

A previous study by the same researchers looked at the effects of substantial tax increases in Alaska, and found that the increased taxes helped reduce the alcohol-related mortality rate. The researchers decided to conduct a similar study in Florida because Alaska has a substantially higher rate of alcohol-related deaths than the national average and is very different in characteristics when compared to other states.

The last time alcohol taxes were raised in Florida was in 1981, when the per-gallon tax on beer increased from $0.40 to $0.48, the per-gallon wine tax went from $1.75 to $2.25, and the per-gallon tax on spirits went from $4.75 to $6.50.

Wagenaar explained that due to inflation, Florida’s alcohol taxes are a quarter of what they were in the 1960s, so returning them to the 1960s levels would save about 1,500 lives per year.

Sources: Science Daily, Alcohol Taxes Can Reduce Death Rates Among Chronic Heavy Drinkers, August 9, 2010

Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, Effects of Alcohol Taxes on Alcohol-Related Mortality in Florida: Time-Series Analyses From 1969 to 2004, July 23, 2010

Increasing Alcohol Taxes Could Save Lives, Florida Study Shows is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment