<story><title>With a nudge from AI, ketamine emerges as a potential rare disease treatment</title><url>https://www.statnews.com/2021/08/05/artificial-intelligence-rare-disease-andp-medikanren/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>irthomasthomas</author><text>Sorry to burst your bubble but U.S. drug policy is not as progressive as you might think. Cannabis is still illegal under federal law. And right now America is petitioning the WHO for a GLOBAL ban on KRATOM, a herb which has been used in Asia for hundreds of years with no recorded deaths. It has been in use in Europe and America for a couple of decades and still there are no deaths recorded from pure Kratom use. Kratom can be used to treat or replace alcohol, cocaine and opiate addiction. It is a herb harvested from the leaves of a tree related to the coffee plant and has incredible pain relieving properties, as well as being a mild stimulant and mood regulator. For more info see this recent study &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&amp;#x2F;pmc&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;PMC6612999&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&amp;#x2F;pmc&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;PMC6612999&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;And please tell the FDA and WHO not to ban this awesome herb. The deadline for comments is August 9th. &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.americankratom.org&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.americankratom.org&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>tomato-sauce</author><text>It feels like in the last few years I have been constantly hearing about new research showing “fun” drugs as cures to a wide array of medical conditions. There’s marijuana for chronic pain, mushrooms for depression, mdma for ptsd, and now ketamine. They are often talked about as if they have little or no harmful side effects. I’m glad we are moving away from the incredibly destructive drug policies that have been in place for so long but I fear the pendulum may be swinging too far the other way. The opioid epidemic was largely caused by the idea of them being non addictive being heavy pushed by the pharmaceuticals industry. Are we going to see similar harms from these drugs a few years after they gain more popularity? So far the evidence doesn’t show anything near this level of harm. I’m just skeptical of anything that seems too good to be true.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>PragmaticPulp</author><text>Please don’t glorify Kratom as some sort of miracle herb without downsides.&lt;p&gt;Kratom is an opioid, full stop. People are under the mistaken impression that it’s less addictive because it’s less potent on a per-gram basis, but addicts simply end up consuming more grams to get similar highs.&lt;p&gt;It’s not a “mood regulator” in any magical sense other than it’s an opioid and opioids temporarily put people in good moods.&lt;p&gt;There are many communities dedicated to quitting Kratom and handling Kratom withdrawal, which is the same as withdrawing from other opioids (For instance: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.reddit.com&amp;#x2F;r&amp;#x2F;quittingkratom&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.reddit.com&amp;#x2F;r&amp;#x2F;quittingkratom&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt; ).&lt;p&gt;Whether or not you think Kratom should be legal, we shouldn’t be glorifying it as a harmless substance that somehow defies the realities of every other opioid.</text></comment>
<story><title>With a nudge from AI, ketamine emerges as a potential rare disease treatment</title><url>https://www.statnews.com/2021/08/05/artificial-intelligence-rare-disease-andp-medikanren/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>irthomasthomas</author><text>Sorry to burst your bubble but U.S. drug policy is not as progressive as you might think. Cannabis is still illegal under federal law. And right now America is petitioning the WHO for a GLOBAL ban on KRATOM, a herb which has been used in Asia for hundreds of years with no recorded deaths. It has been in use in Europe and America for a couple of decades and still there are no deaths recorded from pure Kratom use. Kratom can be used to treat or replace alcohol, cocaine and opiate addiction. It is a herb harvested from the leaves of a tree related to the coffee plant and has incredible pain relieving properties, as well as being a mild stimulant and mood regulator. For more info see this recent study &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&amp;#x2F;pmc&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;PMC6612999&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&amp;#x2F;pmc&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;PMC6612999&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;And please tell the FDA and WHO not to ban this awesome herb. The deadline for comments is August 9th. &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.americankratom.org&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.americankratom.org&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>tomato-sauce</author><text>It feels like in the last few years I have been constantly hearing about new research showing “fun” drugs as cures to a wide array of medical conditions. There’s marijuana for chronic pain, mushrooms for depression, mdma for ptsd, and now ketamine. They are often talked about as if they have little or no harmful side effects. I’m glad we are moving away from the incredibly destructive drug policies that have been in place for so long but I fear the pendulum may be swinging too far the other way. The opioid epidemic was largely caused by the idea of them being non addictive being heavy pushed by the pharmaceuticals industry. Are we going to see similar harms from these drugs a few years after they gain more popularity? So far the evidence doesn’t show anything near this level of harm. I’m just skeptical of anything that seems too good to be true.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>loeg</author><text>Kratom is fundamentally an opioid.  It happens to be cheap and relatively safe (consumed by ingesting large quantities of plant matter, rather than injection or insufflation of some extremely potent compound).  I think opioids are over-vilified in general, and I&amp;#x27;m on the side of legalization, but kratom isn&amp;#x27;t magic.</text></comment>