Post by Ann on May 21, 2004 12:39:42 GMT -5
Someone on the board wanted to know about the new vaccine:
Health - AFP
New vaccine aims to take the joy out of smoking
Fri May 21, 7:20 AM ET
STOCKHOLM (AFP) - A new vaccine that aims to take the joy out of smoking, thus making it easier to stop, will be tested later this year in Sweden.
The vaccine does not remove smokers' nicotine craving but instead blocks nicotine's access to the brain, thereby removing the stimulation that makes smoking pleasurable, Swedish daily Svenska Dagbladet reported Friday.
"Since the nicotine doesn't reach the brain, there is no rewarding effect," Lena Degling Wikingsson, chief executive of Independent Pharmaceutica, the company developing the vaccine, told the paper.
"By making smoking unattractive, one avoids relapses," she said.
The vaccine, which has been tested on rats, activates the immune system, and antibodies attach themselves to the nicotine molecules, making them too large to pass through the blood-brain barrier.
The company is currently trying to recruit some 40 non-smoking Swedes for tests aimed at ensuring that the vaccine is free of dangerous and uncomfortable side-effects.
Once the initial testing is over, it will test it on smokers.
If it proves efficient, the vaccine could in the future be used as a deterrent as well as for stopping teenagers from getting hooked.
According to Svenska Dagbladet, British and US researchers have already begun testing similar vaccines on both non-smokers and smokers, but Wikingsson said Independent Pharmaceutica's vaccine will prove more efficient.
"Animal testing shows that our antibodies are more specific, and thus more efficient and more longlasting," she told the paper.
The Swedish parliament voted last week in favour of a government proposal to ban smoking in bars and restaurants in the country starting in June next year.
The URL for this article is:
story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1507&e=3&u=/afp/20040521/hl_afp/health_smoking_sweden_040521112005
Health - AFP
New vaccine aims to take the joy out of smoking
Fri May 21, 7:20 AM ET
STOCKHOLM (AFP) - A new vaccine that aims to take the joy out of smoking, thus making it easier to stop, will be tested later this year in Sweden.
The vaccine does not remove smokers' nicotine craving but instead blocks nicotine's access to the brain, thereby removing the stimulation that makes smoking pleasurable, Swedish daily Svenska Dagbladet reported Friday.
"Since the nicotine doesn't reach the brain, there is no rewarding effect," Lena Degling Wikingsson, chief executive of Independent Pharmaceutica, the company developing the vaccine, told the paper.
"By making smoking unattractive, one avoids relapses," she said.
The vaccine, which has been tested on rats, activates the immune system, and antibodies attach themselves to the nicotine molecules, making them too large to pass through the blood-brain barrier.
The company is currently trying to recruit some 40 non-smoking Swedes for tests aimed at ensuring that the vaccine is free of dangerous and uncomfortable side-effects.
Once the initial testing is over, it will test it on smokers.
If it proves efficient, the vaccine could in the future be used as a deterrent as well as for stopping teenagers from getting hooked.
According to Svenska Dagbladet, British and US researchers have already begun testing similar vaccines on both non-smokers and smokers, but Wikingsson said Independent Pharmaceutica's vaccine will prove more efficient.
"Animal testing shows that our antibodies are more specific, and thus more efficient and more longlasting," she told the paper.
The Swedish parliament voted last week in favour of a government proposal to ban smoking in bars and restaurants in the country starting in June next year.
The URL for this article is:
story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1507&e=3&u=/afp/20040521/hl_afp/health_smoking_sweden_040521112005
