War on Drugs
milhayser | September 29, 2013The U.S. "war on drugs," besides failing to meet its goals, has demonstrated a stubborn ignorance of the effects that different drugs have in the human body. Granted, some drugs cause degeneration and are properly outlawed. Opiates such as heroin and stimulants such as cocaine and methamphetamine take a harsh physical toll and leave users addicted to the chemical. But classified along with these truly dangerous drugs are some of nature's most mysterious medicines. New research shows how marijuana, psychedelics, MDMA and even ketamine have positive physiological and psychological effects that…
terrasig | December 9, 2009By way of my substance abuse blogger colleague, The Discovering Alcoholic, I learned of yesterday's New York Times article by Sarah Kershaw on Dr. A. Thomas McLellan. McLellan is a psychologist and drug abuse researcher with over 400 peer-reviewed publications to his credit. He held an academic appointment at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and was scientific director of the Treatment Research Institute which he co-founded in 1992 with Jack Durell, MD, and other researchers from Penn's Center for the Studies of Addiction.
However, McLellan is not a career bureaucrat like…
sciencepunk | July 1, 2009The Ministry of Defence has been left with egg on its face after a much-vaunted seizure of 1.3 tonnes of poppy seed turned out to be mung beans. The food crop was taken during Operation Panther Claw, breathlessly reported as a major strike at the heart of Afghanistan's terror network.
After having the seeds tested by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation in Kabul, the Guardian reports that officials have acknowledged their error and promised to return the mung beans to their rightful owner.
At the time, Colonel General Khodaidad, Afghanistan's minister of counter-narcotics, claimed…