Vaccines for Addiction? How about a Vaccine for an Addiction to Vaccines?

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http://www.kentucky.com/148/story/478088.html

Vaccines for drug addicts forecast

By Girard

News Service

WASHINGTON — Vaccines that can help people fight addictions to

harmful drugs such as nicotine and methamphetamine could be available

to the public within two or three years, four leading drug abuse

researchers told a congressional briefing this week.

The researchers said they all had developed vaccines that work in the

same basic way. In a cocaine vaccine, for example, cocaine molecules

are attached to harmful bacteria, which is then introduced into the

bloodstream. The body makes antibodies for the cocaine; if any

subsequent cocaine molecules enter the body, the antibodies prevent

them from reaching the brain, neutralizing the drug's effect.

The researchers said users of the harmful drugs would eventually

learn that there was no longer a reward for taking them, and they

would stop using them.

" Eventually, they couldn't afford enough cocaine to overcome the

antibodies, " said Kosten, psychiatry and neuroscience

professor at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

The researchers cited several other benefits of the vaccines,

including preventing the effects of drug overdoses and protecting

fetuses from drugs taken by pregnant women.

They said that in the future, there is a possibility that the

vaccines could keep people from ever becoming addicted to drugs, but

that their research so far has focused on stopping existing

addictions.

The researchers said their vaccines have been shown to work on animal

subjects, and some were successful in human trials.

Their biggest problem now, they said, is the lack of funding and

support from large pharmaceutical companies.

Kosten said he and his colleagues have worked extensively with Russia

and China to develop heroin and morphine vaccines, but they have not

received the same level of commitment from U.S. companies.

" When we get help from big pharma, it makes a huge difference, " he

said. It " is in their interest to do this. It's certainly in the

interest of public health. "

The researchers noted some potential problems.

One is that because the vaccines don't remove a person's addiction,

people will take more of the drug in an attempt to get high.

Kosten said his cocaine vaccine causes few health problems, even when

the cocaine levels in the blood stream are 10 times normal. But if

cigarette smokers start to smoke more because of a vaccine, the

increased level of carcinogens and toxins could have adverse effects,

he said.

Another problem with the vaccines is that many people have multiple

addictions, and the reduction of one addiction could lead to the

increase in use of another harmful drug.

Owens, director of the Center for Alcohol and Drug Abuse at

the University of Arkansas, emphasized that the need will continue

for other medications as well as therapy, to make sure people do not

start using more of other drugs or stop taking the vaccine.

But the researchers expressed confidence that such complications

could be managed and that their vaccines would become useful for the

treatment of " urgent " health safety issues.

" Substance abuse and addiction is not something that we can keep on

being passive about, " said Nora Volkow, director of the National

Institute on Drug Abuse. " We should be fighting with the same

determination for developing treatments as we have for other

diseases. "