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Beating Heroin Addiction
– Reported, May 08, 2013
(Ivanhoe Newswire) In a study by The Scripps Research Institute, a new heroin vaccine has been shown to successfully prevent relapse in heroin addicted mice by stopping the drugs psychoactive breakdown products from reaching the brain. The vaccine could be a significant breakthrough in the treatment of heroin addiction because effective vaccines are difficult to create due to how quickly the drug breaks down in the blood stream.
To test the vaccines effectiveness, researchers created two tests using heroin addicted mice: one testing relapse in mice previously exposed to heroin and one testing relapse in mice with serious heroin addiction. After being able to receive transfusions of heroin, the mice then went through a period where they no longer had access to the drug. Some were given the vaccine while others were not. In both tests the vaccine blocked relapse and even if the mice were given a dose of heroin they did not return to compulsively seeking out heroin.
For more information, go to http://www.scripps.edu/.
SOURCE: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, May 2013