Boffins invent miracle pill that counteracts effects of booze Biology boffins have turned their hand to something useful: a pill to stop you acting drunk no matter how many pints you put away. It's your mutinous immune system that gives you that sozzled feeling after a boozy session, scientists claim in a paper published today in the British Journal of Pharmacology. Conk out certain …
No, ugly won't be bred out of the gene pool - beautiful people will become more beautiful, and us ugly sods will get more and more ugly. And there are more ugly people around than beautiful people.
So I say to you beautiful people - if you don't want to be surrounded by more and more increasingly hideous people - act now - shag someone ugly today!
Once this stuff because well known and well researched enough, it might eventually become accepted. Especially if we can make it work reliably and quickly.
Start with applying it to addicts and overdosers, then gradually expand its use from there once we have a good handle on any side effects and risks associated with the meds.
I don't think the magic pill is really going to help addicts and overdosers. Addicts don't keep drinking to avoid the hangover, they're generally trying to escape something else, and you could still overdose, in fact maybe more so. This drug only stops the effect of the drug on the brain, your kidneys and liver will still have to sort out all the crap you've tipped down your throat.
Evolution gave us pain because the human body doesn't come with a user manual.
> Has there ever been one? I often enjoy a drink, but I've never enjoyed being drunk.
Yes, there is a very important reason to "be drunk".
It lets you know that if you don't let up then you will get alchohol poisoning and DIE.
Having some sort of adverse reaction ingesting a poison is not a bad thing really.
If you don't want to feel the effects or you need to operate machinery - don't drink alcohol - simples.
Some of us enjoy the feeling of having one or three over the eight occasionally.
A more useful path of study would be how to block the hangover - a morning after(the night before) pill.
Personally I would love to be able to knock back a "few" pints on a hot day or relish the taste subtleties in a succession of glasses of different single malts or good brandies without losing taste, mental function and the ability to get home on the bike safely to the damn side effects...
"Though a pill to let enjoy your favourite tipple without getting drunk appears to be a godsend"
You say godsend, I say complete waste of time. Getting pissed it the point is what makes it my favourite tipple. You think people drink stella because of the refreshing taste ?.
(the alcoholism bit is the godsend, but that was only mentioned in passing)
Ok, so it's 'accepted' and peer-reviewed, but not yet published. Fine. But also it doesn't seem to report any new results by the author. It's like a mini-review of some other paper (Wu et al 2011), along with other papers in the literature that comes to the conclusion. Is this normal in medical molecular biology?
Well the pill bit might be new but I remember the newspapers reporting an injectable drug that completely, but temporarily, reversed the effects of drunkeness more than 25 years ago. (Sufficiently pre-Internet that there's no chance of finding a link for you.)
When the injection wore off you went back to being drunk again! It was touted as being some sort of emergency cure: if you got pissed and left the baby behind somewhere then the police could sober you up sharpish and save the baby, or some such nonsense - you know what the press are like.
Anyway, no use for it then and so probably no use for it now.
/ Beer icon, obviously
There is also evidence to suggest that the cytokine response is involved in the 'glutamate storm' that occurs when large amounts of glutamate are released during a stroke or other neurological trauma, so this could conceivably also help prognosis in stroke patients, or in cases of head trauma such as concussion.
I'm newly teetotal (again, after a couple of weeks relapse) and now I don't get to feel smugly superior and blackmail people after all? The only amusement I'll have is hearing their livers exploding from time to time!
More seriously, if this were readily available it would be a good way to thin the naturally irresponsible from society (through their livers exploding) kinda like we do with cars for teenagers.
Wouldn't that mean there's a danger of some idjit* drinking, taking the pill, and not being too sloshed to stop drinking? Surely this pill doesn't counteract alcohol poisoning.
* Yeah, it'd be their own dang fault, and go into the darwin award category. It might have implications for bar owners in the states, unfortunately.
And they must be managed by manual intervention so that misfortunates with allergies and addictions and the like can lead a normal life.
"“Medications targeting Toll-like Receptor 4 may prove beneficial in treating alcohol dependence and acute overdoses,” says Dr Hutchinson."
Although if this was developed further it might have commercial application as a sober-up pill - presuming it's possible to 'sober up' by taking the inhibitor AFTER alcohol. I wouldn't complain if I could have a night on the town and take a tablet that gives me back the mental focus and energy to walk home safely and chug enough water to keep my kidneys semi-happy until morning before rolling into bed. There is always the possibility of it being misused if it was wildly available, but there's no sense in blaming the tools for what is done with them.
"you'll be able to walk in a straight line, perform complex manual tasks and probably even stay awake on the night bus home after a heavy dose of alcoholic refreshment."
That pill sounds worse than making fully grown men put up shelves whilst wearing goggles, ear muffs, gloves, kneepads, a hairnet, overalls and keeping a fire extinguisher nearby.
What these scientists are doing to my colossal benders is yet another sorry sign of madness gone politically correct.
It won't be long before the temperance movement and super-Christians are pushing their legislators to ban this evil product. After all won't it make it more difficult for the police to determine if a person is above the ever decreasing legal limit and allow people to actually enjoy wine with their dinner without having to worry about drinking a whole glass. Mark my words, the religious right will be all over this in short order, right after they stockpile a personal supply.
Possible side effects include: change in mood, increased sweating, nausea, nervousness, restlessness, trembling, vomiting, allergic reactions such as rash or swelling, dizziness, fainting, fast or irregular pulse, flushing, headache, heart rhythm changes, seizures, sudden chest pain
"... change in mood, increased sweating, nausea, restlessness, vomiting, dizziness, fainting, flushing..."
<Looks at list of my prescribed medicines>
Yup. That lot appear on most of them as side effects.. especially some of the more powerful painkillers (Tramadol - I'm looking at you!).
Unfortunately for the chaps at the University of Illinois, this research had already been preformed on the booze-foamed shores of New Zealand. A clinically-tested preventative product has even come about from the work done a few years back by our sozzled scientists, called "HangoverOver". The biggest problem they've had (from a marketing standpoint) is convincing drinkers that it's a real thing and not just snake oil.
Effects observed in rats/mice do not always translate to humans. Let's see if this ever makes it to the clinical trial stage...
Personally I don't mind being wobbly and un-coordinated when I'm pissed. Helps me to realise that I am actually pissed and that I don't need to keep cramming pints/spirits down my neck at the same rate.
Will still no doubt have to break down all this excess alcohol.
I could see many more incidents if these are widely available.
Still, I like the idea. Say you're having one too many, and then a serious situation arises, it would be nice to have the option to sober up and sort it out.
No use for drink driving, since the alcohol is still sloshing in your system, at no doubt a higher BAC than allowable.
Thing is though, it's illegal to drink and drive because: your reaction times are slower, you are less attentive, more drowsy, more confident than normal (think you can drive better than you actually can), misjudge speed and distance, etc. It's not the fact that your BAC is over some pre-determined limit that makes it illegal to drink and drive; it's that having a BAC over a certain limit (one at which you are determined to be "drunk") causes all the effects I just described. If those effects were caused by some other intoxicant or a medication then you would still be unfit to drive, and you would still have comitted an offence, even if your BAC was below the legal limit.
The interesting question is whether this drug - if the effects do translate to humans - negates all the ill effects of being drunk in the first place. Could you potentially have a situation where you've had enough alcohol to stun an elephant, yet you're still perfectly in control of all your faculties and fine motor control - thus allowing you to drive perfectly normally and not in any way dangerously. In those circumstances, would it still then be illegal to get behind the wheel of a car? Your BAC might make the intoximeter/breathalyser explode, but you wouldn't be suffering any of the ill effects usually associated with alcohol. How would the police/law determine whether you are unfit to drive? Our current system of measuring blood alcohol content wouldn't work.
Of course this is all purely speculation, and drinking alcohol without having the ill effects sort of defeats the point, but thought experiments can be fun...
Take the synthebrew googles, and reverse the effects. In a pill.
Now, seriously. There are some drinks you only take to get high. There are others that taste really good, but they just happen to contain alcohol, not that you'd like to get high after drinking....
I can see serious amount of this stuff available to military reserve forces, and heavy machine operators that are called on short notice (or whatever branch of operations where it would be needed people to sober up in a dime), should all the premises mentioned in blcollier's post hold true.
If it holds true, the designated driver could also drink. Or you should keep a few of these on the car dash. You get the point.
The reason drink/drive legislation was originally brought in was because alcohol causes all the things you mention. However, under the current legislation, if you drink enough that your BAC is above the limit, you have committed a crime - end of story. It doesn't matter if the alcohol has had no effect on you due to this drug - you'll lose your license.
Yes, but if we were in a situation whereby everyone that has a BAC higher than the legal limit is suffering no effects of the alcohol at all, would not the current legislation need to be revised?
I know it's possible for some people to be over the legal limit yet not have the alcohol touch them, and for others to have even half a pint and be falling all over the place. But if it's possible for *everyone* to suffer no ill effects from alcohol (only talking about driving ability here, not your liver), regardless of the amount they have drunk, it rather invalidates the current method for testing intoxication.
Like I said it's purely hypothetical - I highly doubt that this will be a magic pill that allows you to get rid of all negative effects of booze almost instantly/
The only reason too drink is to act stupid! Just 'cos you boffins don't like having fun, no need to ruin it for the rest of us!
Seriously though, isn't the reason you immune system goes groggy an attempt to ensure you don't get hurt so badly? You only have to watch a drunk trip over and fall flat on his face, get up and carry on walking home to see his immune system being in sleep mode is doing him some good!
When they come across a drinks fighting, laying in the gutter or harassing emergency staff, a Tazer-like gun to shoot them full of this stuff would save a lot of time and money.
Can you imagion the reaction when they suddenly wake up in the gutter covered in vomit & piss and have to walk home like that stone cold sober!
Do that a few times and even the dumbest members of our society might decide there are better ways "to have fun" than getting so waisted you cannot remember it.
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