ThinkBlog

If you could forget painful memories with a pill, would you do it? Canadian researchers may have struck gold in a drug that is designed to blank patients’ painful memories. It could be exceedingly beneficial for PTSD, but would it stop there or would it turn into a Ritalin: Part II, where everyone has “some” symptoms that need to be “controlled” medically? This is a subject near and dear to my heart; I’ll be revisiting this next week. But for now, read the article; and note what one reader insightfully said:

Jan Johnstone from Kincardine, Canada writes: It is a huge ethical dilemma. Once the drug companies get a hold of it, it becomes marketed as a fix for everything. I remember reading advertisements in People Magazine for a popular antidepressant. Part of the script was aimed at getting rid of those pesky sad feelings of grief. Don’t feel blue, ask your doctor for this. But feeling grief and sorrow is a good thing, unless we all believe that certain emotions and states of being are more desirable. Dito for this drug. Our memories, no matter how painful, are important. This drug if marketed should be limited. I could see uses for it but it should not be the pancea for all bad memories. I think there could be uses for it, especially around people who have bad memories around torture.

Technorati Tags: medicine, memory, ethics, propranolol, anxiety

If you could forget painful memories with a pill, would you do it? Canadian researchers may have struck gold in a drug that is designed to blank patients’ painful memories. It could be exceedingly beneficial for PTSD, but would it stop there or would it turn into a Ritalin: Part II, where everyone has “some” symptoms that need to be “controlled” medically? This is a subject near and dear to my heart; I’ll be revisiting this next week. But for now, read the article; and note what one reader insightfully said:

Jan Johnstone from Kincardine, Canada writes: It is a huge ethical dilemma. Once the drug companies get a hold of it, it becomes marketed as a fix for everything. I remember reading advertisements in People Magazine for a popular antidepressant. Part of the script was aimed at getting rid of those pesky sad feelings of grief. Don’t feel blue, ask your doctor for this. But feeling grief and sorrow is a good thing, unless we all believe that certain emotions and states of being are more desirable. Dito for this drug. Our memories, no matter how painful, are important. This drug if marketed should be limited. I could see uses for it but it should not be the pancea for all bad memories. I think there could be uses for it, especially around people who have bad memories around torture.

Technorati Tags: medicine, memory, ethics, propranolol, anxiety