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Debate grows over 'brain steroids'
[SIZE=-1]San Francisco Chronicle, USA [/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Get ready to confront such questions in daily life, a group of scientists and policy experts urge in a thought-provoking commentary published online Sunday by the journal Nature.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Brain research is accelerating, and a new era of "cognitive enhancement" - the use of brain-stimulating drugs and devices by healthy people - is approaching, the authors said.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]While thorny ethical and medical questions must be addressed, pharmaceutical enhancement of inborn mental gifts is a trend to be welcomed, the seven co-authors from Harvard, Stanford and other prestigious institutions said. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]"We call for a presumption that mentally competent adults should be able to engage in cognitive enhancement using drugs," said the writers, who include Stanford law professor Henry Greely and neuropsychology professor Barbara Sahakian at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. "From assembly line workers to surgeons, many different kinds of employee may benefit from enhancement and want access to it, yet they may also need protection from the pressure to enhance."[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Sahakian and another co-author, Ronald Kessler of Harvard Medical School, are consultants for pharmaceutical companies. Nature noted no conflicts of interest for the other five authors, who include the publication's editor-in-chief, Philip Campbell.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Dr. Russell Reiff, a developmental and behavioral pediatrician at Kaiser Permanente in San Francisco, said he fears the paper will "fuel the fire of what we call prescribing pressure." Reiff said he always looks for alternatives before prescribing attention deficit disorder drugs such as Ritalin and Adderall, which contain amphetamines [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]...[/SIZE]
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[SIZE=-1]San Francisco Chronicle, USA [/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Get ready to confront such questions in daily life, a group of scientists and policy experts urge in a thought-provoking commentary published online Sunday by the journal Nature.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Brain research is accelerating, and a new era of "cognitive enhancement" - the use of brain-stimulating drugs and devices by healthy people - is approaching, the authors said.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]While thorny ethical and medical questions must be addressed, pharmaceutical enhancement of inborn mental gifts is a trend to be welcomed, the seven co-authors from Harvard, Stanford and other prestigious institutions said. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]"We call for a presumption that mentally competent adults should be able to engage in cognitive enhancement using drugs," said the writers, who include Stanford law professor Henry Greely and neuropsychology professor Barbara Sahakian at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. "From assembly line workers to surgeons, many different kinds of employee may benefit from enhancement and want access to it, yet they may also need protection from the pressure to enhance."[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Sahakian and another co-author, Ronald Kessler of Harvard Medical School, are consultants for pharmaceutical companies. Nature noted no conflicts of interest for the other five authors, who include the publication's editor-in-chief, Philip Campbell.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]Dr. Russell Reiff, a developmental and behavioral pediatrician at Kaiser Permanente in San Francisco, said he fears the paper will "fuel the fire of what we call prescribing pressure." Reiff said he always looks for alternatives before prescribing attention deficit disorder drugs such as Ritalin and Adderall, which contain amphetamines [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]...[/SIZE]
More...
