Cognitive Enhancement

Whats your take on cognitive enhancement? Don't know what it is? Check out the article! Or these links...

Chemical dependency counseling

Addiction physiology

"Exploring the development of a rational attitude towards cognitive enhancement. 

Cognitive enhancement is not about future generations playing video games via neural implants and thought interfaces. Presently, it is about a large fraction of the world’s scientists shortening their lives with caffeine, nicotine, and sugar intake that leads to diabetes and cardiovascular illnesses via hypertension with high blood pressure and heart troubles, teeth grinding, frequent urination, and so on. Coffee is a must at all conferences. No brew, no chance of surviving afternoon talks in a fully conscious state.

The irony is, in a world with modafinil, piracetam, and methylphenidate, and where the cardio-toxic problems from caffeine are well known, precisely those who should know best, the scientists, are collectively ignorant. Why? Want it or not – cognitive enhancement is also about the idiotic war on drugs which is terribly costly to all of society.

Paul Erdös (1913-1996) created his mathematics with the help of methylphenidate and amphetamines without becoming addicted for over 25 years. Sure, he also drank a lot of coffee; he coined the phrase “Mathematicians are machines for turning coffee into theorems.” This is a statement about the situation as it presents itself today, but it should not be misread as endorsing caffeine!

Erdös drank coffee more due to being addicted to it than due to coffee helping him much. In 1979, he won a $500 bet by abstaining from amphetamine for a month. In reality, amphetamines are much less addictive than certain parties want us to believe. But the more interesting moral of the story is: Erdös felt the progress of mathematics had been held up for a whole month by that stupid wager. Caffeine alone could not do the job.

Although some of the world’s most genius role models have proven that there are better ways, scientists today feel they would descend to the level of criminals, be drop-outs trying to get high, or join hippies gulping LSD in search of ‘outer dimensions’ if they were to embrace cognitive enhancement rationally.

Cognitive enhancement is about insufficient health care for poor people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), about the many undiagnosed who self-medicate, and it thus is once more about the profits of drug cartels selling methamphetamine, about the huge numbers of incarcerated innocent people, about real wars triggered by illicit drug economics, even about promiscuity and crime.

Cognitive enhancement is thus presently an urgent public health and safety issue. I hope to be able to help getting scientists from all over the scientific fields to recognize these issues as their own. Starting via their personal involvement and self-interest may do the trick. This in turn starts with the highly addictive cup of coffee in the morning.

So, which route can lead us to a widely adopted, rational attitude towards cognitive enhancement?

Might it be effective to go via technocrats, say, convincing the Chinese leadership to allow methylphenidate and modafinil on a trial basis for scientists above the postgraduate level? Perhaps only after Asia is firmly established as the scientific leader, will Westerners wake up and recognize the significance of these issues.

After all, scientists in more indirectly repressive regimes are so brainwashed by ‘Reefer Madness’ scare-mongering that they may not be the best target in an efficient campaign. Even those working on the subject and knowing better are still today often pressured into contributing to misinformation. David Nichols, who at times was a collaborator of Alexander Shulgin, has recently given us another bad example of this.

Anyway, although it is almost snobbishly arrogant to do so and only proof of my privileged position given the severity of the complex issue, I would like to end this post on a positive note.

We should always focus on what we can do now to improve the situation."

The irony is, in a world with modafinil, piracetam, and methylphenidate, and where the cardio-toxic problems from caffeine are well known, precisely those who should know best, the scientists, are collectively ignorant. Why? Want it or not – cognitive enhancement is also about the idiotic war on drugs which is terribly costly to all of society.

Paul Erdös (1913-1996) created his mathematics with the help of methylphenidate and amphetamines without becoming addicted for over 25 years. Sure, he also drank a lot of coffee; he coined the phrase “Mathematicians are machines for turning coffee into theorems.” This is a statement about the situation as it presents itself today, but it should not be misread as endorsing caffeine!

Erdös drank coffee more due to being addicted to it than due to coffee helping him much. In 1979, he won a $500 bet by abstaining from amphetamine for a month. In reality, amphetamines are much less addictive than certain parties want us to believe. But the more interesting moral of the story is: Erdös felt the progress of mathematics had been held up for a whole month by that stupid wager. Caffeine alone could not do the job.

Although some of the world’s most genius role models have proven that there are better ways, scientists today feel they would descend to the level of criminals, be drop-outs trying to get high, or join hippies gulping LSD in search of ‘outer dimensions’ if they were to embrace cognitive enhancement rationally.

Cognitive enhancement is about insufficient health care for poor people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), about the many undiagnosed who self-medicate, and it thus is once more about the profits of drug cartels selling methamphetamine, about the huge numbers of incarcerated innocent people, about real wars triggered by illicit drug economics, even about promiscuity and crime.

Cognitive enhancement is thus presently an urgent public health and safety issue. I hope to be able to help getting scientists from all over the scientific fields to recognize these issues as their own. Starting via their personal involvement and self-interest may do the trick. This in turn starts with the highly addictive cup of coffee in the morning.

So, which route can lead us to a widely adopted, rational attitude towards cognitive enhancement?

Might it be effective to go via technocrats, say, convincing the Chinese leadership to allow methylphenidate and modafinil on a trial basis for scientists above the postgraduate level? Perhaps only after Asia is firmly established as the scientific leader, will Westerners wake up and recognize the significance of these issues.

After all, scientists in more indirectly repressive regimes are so brainwashed by ‘Reefer Madness’ scare-mongering that they may not be the best target in an efficient campaign. Even those working on the subject and knowing better are still today often pressured into contributing to misinformation. David Nichols, who at times was a collaborator of Alexander Shulgin, has recently given us another bad example of this.

Anyway, although it is almost snobbishly arrogant to do so and only proof of my privileged position given the severity of the complex issue, I would like to end this post on a positive note.

We should always focus on what we can do now to improve the situation."

Sascha Vongehr
Ethical Technology

Posted: Feb 8, 2011
Source:http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/vongehr2011020
8

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

The Bad Ban on Miaow Miaow

It's one of those things that has to be done, but you know it can have bad effects. In chemical dependency counseling and addiction physiology you see this alot. Where one thing must be done, but it may have bad outcomes in the short term, but better in the longterm.

"The ban on designer party drug miaow miaow has failed to reduce its availability and may even have driven some users to harder drugs, according to a new report.

 
A survey by the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs has revealed that users have noticed little difference in their ability to get hold of mephredrone, which is nicknamed miaow miaow, since it was banned.

The report, the key findings of which are to be published this week and is the first authoritative survey of mephedrone users since the government added the drug to the list of banned substances in April 2010, reveals that more than half of those questioned had noticed no change in the availability of the drug in their area.

It also shows that 44 per cent of those who have used mephedrone said the ban made them more likely to use the Class A party drug ecstasy instead.
Professor David Nutt, a leading psychopahrmacologist who chairs the committee and has been an outspoken critic of the Home Office's approach to tackling recreational drugs which led to him being sacked as head of the government's official drug advisory council, said banning mephedrone did not appear to have been effective.

He warned that the move, which came after mephedrone had been linked to a number of deaths which were later found not to be attributable to the drug, could be driving demand for other new drugs.

It comes after recent research revealed that 40 new synthetic drugs have flooded into the UK during the past year.

Professor Nutt said: "It is not at all clear that the ban on mephedrone has helped to reduce harm.

"The ban has not greatly affected the availability of mephedrone because people were stockpiling before the ban came in but also because it has been very difficult to stop it from coming into the country.

"The government will look at this survey and say that not everyone will continue to use it and some people have been put off, so the ban is working, but we are also seeing people who did use mephedrone using other things like ecstasy and cocaine.

"One of the dangers of the approach that has been taken is that if we ban every new drug without a balanced view, then people will keep making more new drugs to replace them and eventually they will make something that is extremely toxic which, when kids take it, they will die.

"So we could be provoking harm by the way we are handling these new drugs."

Mephedrone was added to the list of banned substances by the Labour Government in April 2010 and was classified as Class B alongside cannabis and amphetamines.

Possession of mephedrone now carries a maximum sentence of five years while supplying the drug can lead to 14 year imprisonment.

There was intense pressure to ban mephedrone after it was linked to a number of deaths around the country.

On Thursday a coroner warned against taking the drug after two young men discovered hanging in woodland in Northumberland were found to have taken it.

But Professor Nutt insists that compared to other illicit substances, mephedrone is hard to overdose on and in the majority of cases where it has been linked to deaths the drug was subsequently not found to have been implicated.

The new survey, which questioned 1,500 drug users in an online questionnaire, found that 58 per cent of the respondents said they were less likely to use mephedrone since the ban, but 45 per cent said they would still try to get hold of it despite the ban and 51 per cent said the ban had not affected availability of the drug.

A fifth of those who responded said they had experienced a negative reaction to mephedrone after taking it but the drug was ranked eighth in a list of 13 harmful drugs with alcohol, tobacco, heroin and cocaine ahead of it.

Professor Nutt is now calling for the Home Office's Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) to review the ban on mephedrone and said future classifications of new drugs needed to be informed by scientific evidence on the effects and harm that the drugs can cause.

He said: "We need to learn lessons from the knee jerk reaction of a new drug that led to mephedrone being banned. What we have done now is to move users into contact with users and that is potentially very deleterious.

"There is the risk that dealers will encourage users onto other drugs.

"Comparatively, mephedrone is not a potent drug. We don't know if a healthy young person can die from an average dose and you would have to take an awful lot to overdose. There are drugs out there on which it is possible to overdose on 100mg."

The Home Office failed to respond to requests for a comment."

By Richard Gray 9:00PM GMT 12 Feb 2011

Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukne...-suggests.html

A survey by the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs has revealed that users have noticed little difference in their ability to get hold of mephredrone, which is nicknamed miaow miaow, since it was banned.

The report, the key findings of which are to be published this week and is the first authoritative survey of mephedrone users since the government added the drug to the list of banned substances in April 2010, reveals that more than half of those questioned had noticed no change in the availability of the drug in their area.

It also shows that 44 per cent of those who have used mephedrone said the ban made them more likely to use the Class A party drug ecstasy instead.
Professor David Nutt, a leading psychopahrmacologist who chairs the committee and has been an outspoken critic of the Home Office's approach to tackling recreational drugs which led to him being sacked as head of the government's official drug advisory council, said banning mephedrone did not appear to have been effective.

He warned that the move, which came after mephedrone had been linked to a number of deaths which were later found not to be attributable to the drug, could be driving demand for other new drugs.

It comes after recent research revealed that 40 new synthetic drugs have flooded into the UK during the past year.

Professor Nutt said: "It is not at all clear that the ban on mephedrone has helped to reduce harm.

"The ban has not greatly affected the availability of mephedrone because people were stockpiling before the ban came in but also because it has been very difficult to stop it from coming into the country.

"The government will look at this survey and say that not everyone will continue to use it and some people have been put off, so the ban is working, but we are also seeing people who did use mephedrone using other things like ecstasy and cocaine.

"One of the dangers of the approach that has been taken is that if we ban every new drug without a balanced view, then people will keep making more new drugs to replace them and eventually they will make something that is extremely toxic which, when kids take it, they will die.

"So we could be provoking harm by the way we are handling these new drugs."

Mephedrone was added to the list of banned substances by the Labour Government in April 2010 and was classified as Class B alongside cannabis and amphetamines.

Possession of mephedrone now carries a maximum sentence of five years while supplying the drug can lead to 14 year imprisonment.

There was intense pressure to ban mephedrone after it was linked to a number of deaths around the country.

On Thursday a coroner warned against taking the drug after two young men discovered hanging in woodland in Northumberland were found to have taken it.

But Professor Nutt insists that compared to other illicit substances, mephedrone is hard to overdose on and in the majority of cases where it has been linked to deaths the drug was subsequently not found to have been implicated.

The new survey, which questioned 1,500 drug users in an online questionnaire, found that 58 per cent of the respondents said they were less likely to use mephedrone since the ban, but 45 per cent said they would still try to get hold of it despite the ban and 51 per cent said the ban had not affected availability of the drug.

A fifth of those who responded said they had experienced a negative reaction to mephedrone after taking it but the drug was ranked eighth in a list of 13 harmful drugs with alcohol, tobacco, heroin and cocaine ahead of it.

Professor Nutt is now calling for the Home Office's Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) to review the ban on mephedrone and said future classifications of new drugs needed to be informed by scientific evidence on the effects and harm that the drugs can cause.

He said: "We need to learn lessons from the knee jerk reaction of a new drug that led to mephedrone being banned. What we have done now is to move users into contact with users and that is potentially very deleterious.

"There is the risk that dealers will encourage users onto other drugs.

"Comparatively, mephedrone is not a potent drug. We don't know if a healthy young person can die from an average dose and you would have to take an awful lot to overdose. There are drugs out there on which it is possible to overdose on 100mg."

The Home Office failed to respond to requests for a comment."

By Richard Gray 9:00PM GMT 12 Feb 2011

Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukne...-suggests.html

A survey by the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs has revealed that users have noticed little difference in their ability to get hold of mephredrone, which is nicknamed miaow miaow, since it was banned.

The report, the key findings of which are to be published this week and is the first authoritative survey of mephedrone users since the government added the drug to the list of banned substances in April 2010, reveals that more than half of those questioned had noticed no change in the availability of the drug in their area.

It also shows that 44 per cent of those who have used mephedrone said the ban made them more likely to use the Class A party drug ecstasy instead.
Professor David Nutt, a leading psychopahrmacologist who chairs the committee and has been an outspoken critic of the Home Office's approach to tackling recreational drugs which led to him being sacked as head of the government's official drug advisory council, said banning mephedrone did not appear to have been effective.

He warned that the move, which came after mephedrone had been linked to a number of deaths which were later found not to be attributable to the drug, could be driving demand for other new drugs.

It comes after recent research revealed that 40 new synthetic drugs have flooded into the UK during the past year.

Professor Nutt said: "It is not at all clear that the ban on mephedrone has helped to reduce harm.

"The ban has not greatly affected the availability of mephedrone because people were stockpiling before the ban came in but also because it has been very difficult to stop it from coming into the country.

"The government will look at this survey and say that not everyone will continue to use it and some people have been put off, so the ban is working, but we are also seeing people who did use mephedrone using other things like ecstasy and cocaine.

"One of the dangers of the approach that has been taken is that if we ban every new drug without a balanced view, then people will keep making more new drugs to replace them and eventually they will make something that is extremely toxic which, when kids take it, they will die.

"So we could be provoking harm by the way we are handling these new drugs."

Mephedrone was added to the list of banned substances by the Labour Government in April 2010 and was classified as Class B alongside cannabis and amphetamines.

Possession of mephedrone now carries a maximum sentence of five years while supplying the drug can lead to 14 year imprisonment.

There was intense pressure to ban mephedrone after it was linked to a number of deaths around the country.

On Thursday a coroner warned against taking the drug after two young men discovered hanging in woodland in Northumberland were found to have taken it.

But Professor Nutt insists that compared to other illicit substances, mephedrone is hard to overdose on and in the majority of cases where it has been linked to deaths the drug was subsequently not found to have been implicated.

The new survey, which questioned 1,500 drug users in an online questionnaire, found that 58 per cent of the respondents said they were less likely to use mephedrone since the ban, but 45 per cent said they would still try to get hold of it despite the ban and 51 per cent said the ban had not affected availability of the drug.

A fifth of those who responded said they had experienced a negative reaction to mephedrone after taking it but the drug was ranked eighth in a list of 13 harmful drugs with alcohol, tobacco, heroin and cocaine ahead of it.

Professor Nutt is now calling for the Home Office's Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) to review the ban on mephedrone and said future classifications of new drugs needed to be informed by scientific evidence on the effects and harm that the drugs can cause.

He said: "We need to learn lessons from the knee jerk reaction of a new drug that led to mephedrone being banned. What we have done now is to move users into contact with users and that is potentially very deleterious.

"There is the risk that dealers will encourage users onto other drugs.

"Comparatively, mephedrone is not a potent drug. We don't know if a healthy young person can die from an average dose and you would have to take an awful lot to overdose. There are drugs out there on which it is possible to overdose on 100mg."

The Home Office failed to respond to requests for a comment."

By Richard Gray 9:00PM GMT 12 Feb 2011

Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukne...-suggests.html

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

Untitled

Chemical dependency counseling

"The Afghan-Canadian governor of Kandahar has ordered a crackdown on the cultivation of opium after the United Nations urged him to stop the unabated growth of poppy production in his province.

Tooryalai Wesa met Sunday with his district governors and chiefs of police, ordering them to do what they can to eradicate poppy farms amid mounting concerns that more farmers will turn to the illicit but lucrative crop this year.

“Poppy cultivation is prohibited in Islam and illegal in the constitution. Therefore, we are supposed to ban this cultivation,” Mr. Wesa said during the meeting at his palace in Kandahar city, according to a statement from his office.

“Although poppy cultivation has been reduced in a few districts of Kandahar, it is not enough. We are supposed to bring it to zero and pave the way to award logistical support for the farmers.”

It is illegal in Afghanistan to grow opium, the raw ingredient used to make heroin. But the law is viewed by many farmers as more of a nuisance than deterrent and has been widely ignored for years by some police officers.

Attempts at eradicating opium in the province have so far failed. But district governors and police chiefs said they were optimistic such efforts would work this year because security has improved.

Mr. Wesa's announcement comes a month after the UN released a report warning that a dramatic jump in opium prices could lure more Afghan farmers to grow the narcotic, reversing the hard-won gains against the drug trade in recent years.

“This bonanza [for some] may provide farmers with a strong incentive to continue growing opium and even expand cultivation in 2011,” the report said.

There was a 48 per cent plunge in opium production last year mainly due to a plant disease that ravaged crops. That was the likely factor driving the average price of dry opium to $169 (U.S) per kilogram, up from $64 in 2009, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime's Afghanistan Opium Survey.

While opium production fell throughout most of Afghanistan, cultivation in the southern province of Kandahar, where the majority of Canada's 2,900 troops in the war-torn country are based, surged 30 per cent.

“The significant expansion of cultivation in Kandahar province over the past two years must ... be stopped, and we urge the governor and other partners to play an active role in preventing any further increase and to ensure progress is made in eradication,” the report said.

“Further growth in poppy cultivation in Kandahar would have an adverse effect on other provinces as well.”

Just last week, Afghan National Army troops trained by the Canadian military seized 108 kilograms of what was believed to be opium in southeastern region of Panjwaii district.

“The time is right to do this,” Mr. Wesa said in a brief interview after the meeting.

The UN estimates that 25,835 hectares of land in Kandahar province was used to grow opium last year – roughly half the geographic size of Montreal. That's more than five times the area used to cultivate opium in 2004.

The opium growing season lasts from December to May and is about six times more profitable than wheat.

It helps pour cash into the coffers of insurgent groups and is a large factor behind the spike in violence ISAF forces and Afghan civilians encounter during the country's summer fighting season.

With the funds from the trade of opium and other drugs, insurgents pay young, often unemployed men eager for a quick buck to take up arms, plant improvised explosive devices, serve as spies or help their cause in any other way possible.

Mr. Wesa said people caught growing opium would face a prison sentence of one year."

TARA BRAUTIGAM
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan— The Canadian Press
Published Sunday, Feb. 20, 2011 

Source: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/...rticle1914531/

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

Snake Bite Highs?

No not the piercings. Literally snake bites! Its called a venom addiction, but it's not new to chemical dependency counseling or a counseling graduate! This odd addiction is still a serious problem and threat to people and should be taken as serious as a drug addiciton. 

"Two cases of snake venom addicts documented in the January issue of Substance Abuse rekindle the prevalence of a troubling drug trend. Both patients used bites from venomous snakes to get high; their case reports describe feelings of heightened arousal, a sense of well-being, sleepiness, dizziness and lethargy. Sounds like a good time, so long as you can avoid the anaphylaxis, respiratory failure, acute renal failure and kidney failure that snakebites can cause.

Snake Venom as a Drug: Case Studies

In 1990, two additional cases of patients who used snake venom as a drug were featured in the Journal of Postgraduate Medicine. Both men were heroin addicts and preferred the snakebites to heroin; however, the psychiatrists behind the report noted that since the patients didn’t exhibit withdrawal symptoms and did not receive daily snakebites, they probably weren’t addicted to snake venom.

The patients profiled in the 1990 study reported feelings of happiness and grandiosity after receiving a snakebite. They were also able to sleep for hours while high. Initially, one of the patients could sleep for 18 to 20 hours after a single bite; after a few months, he could still sleep for 12 to 14 hours while high on snakebites.

Curiously, the authors of the 1990 report thought that snake venom had broader implications as a treatment for drug addiction. “We feel that snake venom may contain substances [that] reduce mental anguish without addiction,” they wrote.

The Benefits of Snake Venom

The curative potential of snake venom as a drug hasn’t gone away since 1990. Anti-venom is derived from snake venom, and its toxins also have applications in other areas of medicine. In 2004, researchers found that snake venom contains an agent that can hinder blood flow to some cancerous tumors. Researchers at the University of Southern California have been studying snake venom to find a cure for breast cancer. And Aggrastat, a Merck aspirin that fights blood clots, contains a compound based on the anti-clotting properties of snake venom.

While snake venom addicts aren’t likely to proliferate in the U.S., we may see new ways to get high on snake bites in the future if researchers have their way."

10 February 2011
Marissa Brassfield

Source:http://calorielab.com/news/2011/02/1...venom-addicts/

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

A Nationwide Ban

Finally, nationwide bans are being talked about for Bath Salts. Over the past few weeks there has been an explosion of media talking about Bath Salts and their effect on people; as a drug and a profit. Chemical dependency counseling has also been recieving more patients that have been exposed to bath salts, as well as addiction physiology. Read more from ABC...

"(NEW YORK) -- Following bans in Florida, Louisiana and North Dakota, and a warning from White House Drug czar Gil Kerlikowske, New York Senator Charles Schumer has proposed a bill that would add bath salts to a list of federally-controlled substances.

"The longer we wait to ban the substance, the greater risk we put our kids in," Schumer said.  "These so-called bath salts are dangerous drugs masquerading as a harmless product.  They offer a cheap and deadly high, and we need to move immediately to get them off the shelves."

Schumer has also asked New York State Health Commissioner Dr. Nirav Shah to ban the chemicals statewide.  Other states, such as Idaho, are following suit.  The United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and Israel have already banned the chemicals.

The recent flurry of legislation stems from mounting reports of bath salts, plant food and incense made with methylenedioxypyrovalerone and mephedrone causing hallucinations, paranoia, suicidal thoughts, even some deaths."

Source: http://abcnewsradioonline.com

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

 

Don't Attack the People

From humble beginings, to a mess of political wars and strategies, the drugs wars are being taken with a new approach. This article has a mentality of "dont attack the people, attack the profit of the sellers". Chemical dependency counseling or an alcoholism help treatment center is something many people must go through in order to reach recovery. but it canbe avoided if cartels aren't profiting from anything. Check out this article and decide your opinion.

"On March 22, 1921, Stafford E. Beckett, 31, an agent with the United States Department of the Treasury, Border Division, and his partner, Federal Prohibition Agent Charles A. Wood, 35, were shot to death as they attempted to serve a search warrant on whiskey smugglers at a ranch in El Paso, Texas, near the U.S. / Mexican border. The agents were following a tip that 35 cases of Mexican whiskey were being sent across the border into the United States.

At that time, the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which had come into force in January 1920, prohibited the manufacture, sale, and importation of liquor. Thus, Agent Beckett and Agent Wood became two of the first law enforcement casualties of America’s Federal attempts at prohibiting psychoactive substances. Opiates had been locally outlawed in San Francisco in 1875. Despite subsequently being federally prohibited, reroin remains today a popular and dangerous drug on the street in most American cities.

Prohibition reduced liquor consumption but created underground and widespread criminal activity -- organized crime -- which used firearm violence to avoid arrest and prosecution. Prohibition, ended in 1933, was difficult to enforce, bloody, and a complete failure and Americans should have learned from the experience.

I joined the Torrance Police Department in 1986. The Torrance Police Department was a professional, progressive (and aggressive) agency with the blessing of a stable tax base and an educated, involved citizenry that trusted the police department to do the right thing. It was the mid-eighties, and drugs were viewed as the destruction to life and community.

I was a true believer. I knew from my university education that drugs were illegal due to the psychoactive effects they had on people, and that people under the influence were dangerous and a threat to civilized society. Drug addiction was a character issue. Drug enforcement made sense to me as a policy and social issue.

Municipal police departments picked up on the trend and, in the 80s and 90s, sought and received federal funding to form and militarize anti-narcotics teams. Soon the evening news channels were cluttered with local, state and federal agencies serving "high risk" drug warrants. There were billions of dollars of resources being allotted for equipment and overtime, yet there was relatively little dedicated to treatment for users. In my patrol beat of four square miles, I found myself arresting the same 20 drug addicts over and over.

In addition to that, residential burglaries and "commercial boosting" or professional shoplifting were constant in my residential neighborhoods and malls. The cost of the drugs was kept relatively high by interdiction, resulting in frequent burglaries, check fraud, and many business and street robberies committed by those who had reached the desperation point in their addiction.

I came to realize 70% of my city’s crime was driven by addiction. Then there were the constant social consequences of addiction: domestic violence, divorce, abandonment and abuse of children, severe health issues, depression and suicide. Much of it came back to the all-consuming nature of drug addiction -- and incarceration without treatment was the standard response from the criminal justice system.

There is recent hope in this area, at least in California. The Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act, also known as Proposition 36, was passed by 61% of California voters on November 7, 2000. This vote permanently changed state law to allow first- and second-time non-violent, simple drug possession offenders the opportunity to receive substance abuse treatment instead of incarceration. Proposition 36 went into effect on July 1, 2001, with $120 million for treatment services allocated annually for five years. California, however, is near insolvency.

The above problems are the social pathologies that are spun off the prohibition of controlled substances. It was clear to me that the drug war was being lost, and that without radical public policy changes, things would deteriorate. It became clear to me the issue was always going to be about demand for drugs, and that the medical model of addiction was the appropriate strategy to employ, along with chemical dependency counseling.

The coordinated U.S. and Colombian anti-smuggling plan of the early 1990s that succeeded in forcing a change in drug routes from the Caribbean to the Pacific, and caused the cartels to decrease their exposure to losses and extradition, had immense consequences. It was cheaper (and safer) to pay the Mexicans in cash or product to move the product north to market through the tougher (and more profitable) corridors of Mexico.

Tragically, this tactical decision set the stage for the subsequent wars among the six Mexican cartels.

Stratfor, an Austin, TX based global intelligence company that monitors Mexican drug violence, estimates that 27,240 people died in Mexico in drug-related killings from 2006 through December 13, 2010. This period would correspond with the time in which Mexican President Calderon began and prosecuted his war on the Mexican cartels.

So, will the raging worldwide demand for drugs ever end? This is doubtful. As long as there is psychological (and physiological) craving for altered states, then there will be a vigorous drug trade.

You see, the war on drugs begins in our minds.

According to Ronald K. Siegel, a UCLA psychopharmacologist, the need to get high, to alter our current state, is our "fourth drive," a biological drive equivalent to our drives for food, sleep and sex. Siegel believes that throughout history people have always sought out plants, alcohol, and other mind-altering substances to get high. The fourth drive is a natural part of our biology, "creating the irrepressible demand for intoxicating substances"

Because of this natural need to reach altered states, I believe that public drug policy should be focused on state-sponsored pharmacies, much like the state-run liquor stores that exist in states like Idaho. America has the pharmacological know-how to grow, produce, and synthesize marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine, and other psycho-active drugs people crave.

The "law enforcement-industrial complex" is already up and running and could handle any enforcement issues related to minors using adult substances or people operating vehicles while under or acting out in public. We have the expertise and the economic savvy to remove the profit from the drug cartels and produce substances that are safe for recreational use. The key though, is to produce substances cheaply enough, and tax them reasonably so that their price still falls below what a black market producer, a cartel, could afford to market.

Removing the profit from cartels will effectively destroy them."

Monday, 31 January 2011
Jeffrey Haire

Source:http://colombiareports.com/opinion/1...-americas.html

If you are interested in helping others reach recovery through chemical dependency counseling or want to become a Counseling Graduate, then please visit our website at CentaurUniversity.com! Thanks!

The Up and the Down

Drug use is going down, but drug deaths are going up. Different countries are introducing different anti-drug plans to help reduce drug death rates and use continually, but its really up to the people. Someone always finds a way around the "system" ( like bath salts ), but that wont reduce the death rate. Chemical dependency counseling and alcoholism help centers have also been recieving more patients, which is like a double edged sword! Its great to see people seeking help, but it just shows how many people are really addicted...

"Drug-taking is showing signs of levelling out, with a reduction in both intravenous use and the transmission of HIV between consumers. But new phenomena are becoming more prevalent, such as the increase to 5% in drug-related mortality in 2008, which is being partly attributed to the increasing prevalence of cocaine in Europe, the EU Council of Ministers noted, on 31 January in Brussels.

The increase in cocaine use and the attributed deaths, as well as the emergence of more sophisticated forms of production (such as the drug's extraction from other products) and distribution “make it even more essential to find a response that is coordinated at EU level,” member states declared in their conclusions. 

They point to “multiple consumption” particularly at parties where young people have access to illicit drugs and also to legal euphoriants that are often combined with alcohol, with the resulting risk of increased violence, road accidents and harmful effects on health in the long term. Member states have thus begun closer collaboration within the framework of the EU's anti-drug strategy, which is intended to reduce both supply and demand, and have pledged to "redouble efforts” to implement the EU drugs action plan (2009-2012). In addition, measures will be taken to combat multiple consumption at parties from the perspectives of public health and road safety. 

The Commission, for its part, will evaluate the effectiveness of the EU's anti-drug strategy (2005-2012) and the drugs action plan, as well as considering the implementation of Decision 2005/387/JAI on the exchange of information between member states and controlling new psychoactive substances “to analyse the means available to combat these more effectively". "

By Nathalie Vandystadt
Wednesday 02 February 2011

Source: http://www.europolitics.info/social/...294470-26.html

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

Posting About Your Health on Facebook...

It's not suprising that Insurance companies are turning to Clients Facebook's to view their activity and social interactions to determine their benefits. In this article you will see how companies are cracking down over things like Facebook Photos to remove health benefits from their clients. Whether your in chemical dependency counseling, are a counseling graduate, physiology, or just a person in recovery you must be careful about posting health concerns on social networks! 

"If you’re thinking about posting your health or mental health concerns on Facebook or Twitter, you may want to think twice.

According to an article published last week in The LA Times, health insurers will often turn to social networks to check out someone’s story — especially when that person is receiving medical leave or disability payments from an insurer. If you’re filing (or intending to file) a health insurance claim, be careful.

This once-hypothetical scenario is now commonplace, as insurers look for ways to keep cutting costs and payments to what they perceive as people intending to commit fraud against them. In fact, insurance companies don’t just randomly check out a social networking website when a claim comes in — it is now standard practice, according to Peter Foley, vice president of claims administration at the American Insurance Association.

While many of us naively think, “Well, this doesn’t affect me?… I would never commit insurance fraud,” this goes way beyond simply insurance fraud. Ordinary people — people suffering from depression, bipolar disorder, or anxiety disorder — may find themselves being denied their benefits because of a photo uploaded to Facebook. In once case, the photo showed a woman apparently having fun on the beach when she was supposed to be depressed.

The LA Times’ Shan Li has the story…

 

Struggling with depression, the 30-year-old [Nathalie Blanchard] from Quebec, Canada, took a medical leave in early 2008 from her job as an IBM technician. Soon after, she began receiving monthly disability benefits from her insurer, Manulife Financial Corp.

A year later and without warning, the payments stopped.

A representative of the Toronto insurance company told Blanchard that Manulife used photos of her on Facebook — showing her frolicking at a beach and hanging out at a pub — to determine she was depression-free and able to work, said Tom Lavin, Blanchard’s attorney.

Can clinically depressed people not have fun? Not according to the DSM-IV definition of depression. Nowhere does it state that a person who suffers from major depression cannot experience times where their depression temporarily lifts. Nor does it suggest that a person who is depressed can’t go on vacation and attempt to lift their spirits. Which sometimes happens… but the lift is nearly always temporary. Once a person returns home, the depression sets in again.

In the case mentioned in the article, Ms. Blanchard is suing because apparently the insurance company cut off her benefits without warning and without first talking to her doctor.

Which is even more scary, if true. Imagine that your health or mental health benefits cut off not because of a careful and considered medical review of your health and mental health data… but because of photos you uploaded to Facebook!

The challenge we have today with social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter is that people tend not to always use the best judgment in choosing what to share with others. And even if they do, they may not realize that Facebook’s sometimes-complicated and ever-changing privacy settings may allow the public to view components of your life you thought you had sealed off from public view.

The easiest and safest thing to do is to ensure your Facebook profile is locked up tight — friends only for virtually all of the information you share — and that you pick and choose what to post on any social network. Once posted, something may live a lot longer online than you ever intended. So be mindful and intentional in what you post, thinking about the worst case scenario… “What if a future employer saw this? Or my mom? Or my insurance company?”

Is that being overly conservative, cynical even? Perhaps. But at least I’ll have my insurance."

Source: http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2011/02/01/posting-about-health-concern...

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

 

Finger Scans for Clubs?

This is your classic black and white scenario! On one side you have the security of knowing if people are underage and you can keep track of everyone who entered the club. But on the other side people are going to be very upset at handing over their identity! Chemical dependency counseling and a counseling graduate will share a common opinion on this subject.

THOUSANDS of clubbers and pub patrons are being forced to submit to fingerprint and photographic scans to enter popular venues, seemingly unaware of the ramifications of handing over their identity.

Biometric scanners, once the domain of James Bond movies, are flooding the pub market as the fix-all solution to violence and antisocial behaviour. The pubs are exerting more power than the police or airport security by demanding photos, fingerprints and ID. Police can only do it if they suspect someone of committing a crime and they must destroy the data if the person is not charged or found not guilty.

There are no official checks and balances on how the data is collected, stored, used or shared. Federal Privacy Commissioner Tim Pilgrim has warned he does not have the power to audit the systems and the lack of regulation has even industry players calling for tighter controls.

At the Coogee Bay Hotel, patrons not only queue for fingerprint scans, but may then be rejected on the grounds of a curious dress code, which includes a ban on stepped haircuts, a common style where there is a clearly visible line between layers of shaved and unshaved hair. However, complaints have been made that the hotel does not enforce the code unless it wants to refuse entry to groups of Lebanese males.

Despite the explosion in the use of biometric scanners, criminologists at Deakin University warn they have ''slipped'' into use in Australia with ''little public awareness, no policy consideration and questionable claims concerning their effectiveness in enhancing safety and reducing crime''.

The Biometrics Institute of Australia, the main industry group, has already called for changes to the Privacy Act including mandatory privacy impact assessments and audits, no exemptions for any group and a unified national privacy system.

But one scanning company, ID Tect, advertises that the information is stored on a national database and can ''share a banned list of troublemakers - whether that listing is local, statewide or national''. Company director Peter Perrett did not return calls to The Sun-Herald.

The Privacy Commissioner warned that: ''Anyone using this technology should be aware that under the Privacy Act, organisations must provide individuals with notice of what will happen to the collected information. It cannot be automatically shared with other venues, even if the purpose for sharing it is the same across all the organisations.''

An addictions counselor has the same Privacy Act in effect when with clients. 

The Privacy Commissioner has drafted guidelines for ID scanning, which are available on its website.

NightKey fingerprint scanning system director David Wallace has called for regulation and protection of data saying ''anything bad in the industry reflects back on everybody''. NightKey has been working with NSW Police to ensure it complies with security and licensing laws. Mr Wallace said the system was audited annually. He would not reveal the audit results but said the system had been improved based on the findings.

Australasian Council of Security Professionals chairman Jason Brown said biometrics were a higher level of intrusion than just checking a licence and ''it needs to be managed, accountable, audited and subject to the same professional ethics as security and surveillance''.

The fingerprint scanning system takes a photograph of the patron, scans their ID and takes a fingerprint which is converted into a map of the meridian points on the print and converted into a PIN. When a patron returns, the scanner matches the meridian points of their finger to the code to find their identity. The company insists there are no fingerprints kept in the system. Patrons can request their details be deleted from the system although not if they are flagged as troublemakers.

ID Tect scanners scan identities into a database which can be shared with hundreds in the country. The system stores the data for 28 days and then it is deleted. But the troublemakers' IDs can be kept indefinitely.

Among the drinkers scanned on entry to the Coogee Bay Hotel on Australia Day was Ben Davies, a fraud investigator from Mosman. He was ''shocked by the willingness of so many people to hand over their entire lives in this way''.

''You have to be so careful with identification details. If someone breaks into the system, that means someone could be walking around with a fake version of my driver's licence.,'' Mr Davies said.

Laura O'Donnell, a Bondi PR manager, said a driver's licence should be enough.

Tamara Salamacha, of Maroubra, said she did not like such tight controls. But ''like most people in here, I just agreed to let it happen, so I could come in and join my friends''.

Natalie O'Brien and Eamonn Duff
January 30, 2011

Source: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/tec...131-1a9zr.html

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

Spice

A not so new drug that finally started to spread and has been bringing people to chemical dependency counseling. Like many synthetic drugs this one was produced with small intentions of study, but of course caught like wildfire and has now spread all over the word ending people up in hospitals. 

There is a new phenomenon being sold at head shops, smoke shops, gas stations and online. It's called Spice - or K2. It looks like dried oregano and more than a few have also ended up in the hospital with sky-high heart rates and blood pressure. Lots of cities and states have banned it - or are trying. The Rock Hill City Council debated it last night. 

 
JWH-018 is the drug's scientific name in honor of its unlikely inventor. 

JWH stands for John William Huffman. He's 78 and he lives with his wife and two small dogs in a modest house high in the North Carolina mountains overlooking the town of Sylva. 

Huffman came of age in the 1950's, before marijuana was the thing to do. By the 1960's, he was a young father and professor at Clemson University. His work would later make him a hero of recreational drug users craving a legal high. 

 But in one of his few acts of rebellion, he chose chemistry. In the early '90s, Huffman turned his attention to the active compound in marijuana - called THC. 

"THC is actually a rather mediocre cannabinoid," says Huffman. 

When people smoke marijuana, the THC turns on something called a "cannabinoid receptor" in the body. If Huffman could create a compound that flipped that switch even better than THC, other researchers could use it as a tool to unlock the secrets of the cannabinoid receptor. Scientists think it affects things like pain and appetite and may be useful in treating or curing diseases. 

The National Institutes of Health spent $98 million on cannabinoid research during just the last three years. That's where Huffman got the funding that led JWH-018. 

It's "actually quite easy to make for an experienced chemist," says Huffman. 

It's also five times more potent than THC. Huffman first made it in 1995, but it would be 10 years before he published the formula in the journal of Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry. (He did that so other researchers could use it in their own studies.) But underground chemists caught on fast and around 2008, Huffman started seeing JWH-018 pop up in newspaper articles as the latest drug fad. 

"I actually thought it was sort of humorous, and I thought 'Gee it took these people a long time to put one and two together,'" says Huffman. 

But he doesn't think it's funny anymore. 

"No, because it turned out to be dangerous," says Huffman. 

Huffman's synthetic marijuana has prompted hundreds of calls to poison control and landed people in the hospital with racing hearts and dangerously high blood pressure. 

It turns out smoking something five times more potent than pot isn't necessarily five times better. 

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration recently announced a plan to make JWH-018 illegal, but Huffman says that won't work. He made more than 400 variations of the compound. Ban #18 and people will just use another one. 

But he never had second thoughts about all the research he'd done, and he still hopes someday it might lead other researchers to a medical breakthrough. Huffman, however, is done. 

In December, he closed his lab at Clemson and let his last grant expire. He never patented a single one of his compounds - including the one he'll likely be remembered for most. Which means that the people spraying JWH-018 on herbs and selling it at $10 a gram are making more money off Huffman's work than he probably ever will.


Source: http://www.wfae.org/wfae/1_87_316.cf...isplay&id=6843

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!

 

The Dramatic Decrease in Heroin

"There has been a dramatic decrease in the amount of heroin in the UK, BBC, and Chemical Dependency Counseling News has learned.

The Serious Organised Crime Agency claimed the drop was due to supply routes being cut off and said the street price of the drug had doubled.

Europe's biggest drug testing company, Concateno, said the number of addicts testing positively for heroin had halved in the past six months.

However, it warned that suppliers were diluting heroin with other drugs.

If heroin purity returned to normal levels, addicts would face an increased risk of overdose.

There are an estimated 300,000 users of heroin, which comes mainly from Afghanistan and Pakistan, in the UK.

Concateno takes swabs from anyone on a court testing order or in drug treatment for heroin.

Its figures show positive tests occurring in up to 48% of cases over recent years, but last December the rate fell to 22%.

The suggestion of an interruption in the supply is backed up by police reports of shortages in several places in the UK.

Officers from the Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) point to both the efforts of law enforcement agencies and environmental factors such as the floods in Pakistan.

And they say exaggerated perceptions among traffickers of a poppy blight may have led dealers to hold their supplies back and create higher prices on the street.

Relationships between Soca and the Turkish police are also said to be strengthening, leading to pressure on what has been a key supply route.

The drug is now said to command £40,000 a kilo - double the price of last year."

31 January 2011

Source:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12319698

If you are interested in getting certified extremely fast for Chemical Dependency Counseling and becoming a Counseling Graduate feel FREE to visit CentaurUniversity.com!