January 2, 2005

FEAR IS HEALTHY:

'Ecstasy' Use Studied to Ease Fear in Terminally Ill (Rick Weiss, December 27, 2004, Washington Post)

For some, the diagnosis comes out of the blue. For others, it arrives after a long battle. Either way, the news that death is just a few months away poses a daunting challenge for both doctor and patient.

Drugs can ease pain and reduce anxiety, but what about the more profound issues that come with impending death? The wish to resolve lingering conflicts with family members. The longing to know, before it's too late, what it means to love, or what it meant to live. There is no medicine to address such dis-ease.

Or is there?

This month, in a little-noted administrative decision, the Food and Drug Administration gave the green light to a Harvard proposal to test the benefits of the illegal street drug known as "ecstasy" in patients diagnosed with severe anxiety related to advanced cancer.


Of course the very properties that would make it effective for such purposes require that it be unavailable generally.

Posted by Orrin Judd at January 2, 2005 2:38 PM
Comments

Cocaine is sometimes used in surgery. Medical uses are not an issue, only recreational issues.

Posted by: Chris Durnell at January 2, 2005 3:26 PM

Around 1925, my grandfather was visiting a sick friend in the hospital. No semiprivates in those days, all one big ward.

On one bed, a woman was going through her death rattle, screaming that the devil was coming to get her, etc.

Nearby was a young girl whose ailment was a broken leg. My grandfather saw the terror in her eyes.

He went back to his business friends and put the arm on them to build a children's hospital so that that would not happen again.

I have no particular objection to straightening out one's earthly affairs before checking out, but fear for fear's sake is the stock in trade of Christianity, isn't it?

Posted by: Harry Eagar at January 2, 2005 4:10 PM

This story is a bit bizarre. Are these scientists high? Having myself been stupid enough to ingest MDMA once, I can attest to the feelings of euphoria it infuses you with. Delightful. (Great way to have a heart attack, too.) I can also tell you that the comedown is pretty unpleasant. Let me put it this way: you do not feel cheery. How they plan on keeping people on ecstasy for months when they're going to have to be coming down every eight hours is beyond me. It beggars belief. Or do they just plan on administering "half- or quarter-trip" doses 'round the clock? Has it occurred to them that frequent ecstasy use leads to brain damage. These guys are crazy. When I go, I want to be ME. I prefer fear to being a half-cognizant science experiment or worse, a vegetable.

Posted by: anon at January 2, 2005 4:31 PM

Harry:

No, it's mortality's lot.

Posted by: oj at January 2, 2005 4:42 PM

Wow Harry, a slap at Christianity, how unexpected. Well, actually not unexpected at all.

Posted by: Dave W. at January 2, 2005 9:32 PM

require that it be unavailable generally, your straight laces are showing there, daddio. It is available generally, take my word for it.

Posted by: Amos at January 2, 2005 10:28 PM

Amos, dude, you just made OJ's point. Peace, drugs and rock 'n roll!

Posted by: Phil at January 2, 2005 10:55 PM

Also of progressivism, Harry me boy. Happy New Year. Do resolve to stop flattering yourself so.

Posted by: joe shropshire at January 2, 2005 10:56 PM

My grandfather was a high mucketymuck Anglican layman.

I'll leave it to you guys which hospital you want to put your young daughters in.

(Yeah, I thought so.)

Posted by: Harry Eagar at January 4, 2005 12:17 AM

Hospital?

Posted by: oj at January 4, 2005 12:21 AM

Uh huh.

Posted by: Harry Eagar at January 5, 2005 5:49 PM
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