Single Drug to Curb Alcohol and Smoking Dependency

For the alcohol dependent, there is hope from an unlikely quarter. Recent animal studies have shown a drug developed to help people stop smoking to have positive effects in reducing dependence on alcohol. According to researchers, the drug, which has already been approved for use to curb smoking, can cut drinking by half with just one dose. None of the animals given that drug returned to their excessive drinking ways even after the drug was stopped.

The drug has been inducing the same behavior in the animals as currently available drugs prescribed to control alcoholism. In fact, the drug goes one better than those currently prescribed to combat alcoholism. The patient’s appetite remains undiminished with this drug, which is not the case with patients currently fighting alcohol dependency. The drug does not kill appetite as is the case with the most effective of drugs that is used to treat alcohol dependency.

The study has involved rats, which were allowed to consume unhindered excessive quantities of alcohol over a period of a few months. Once they could be labeled as consuming excessive amounts of alcohol on a daily basis, they were administered the drug. The results were startling; the consumption levels fell by half the day after the first dosage. More doses were provided on alternate days for an entire week. The animals maintained their newly acquired lowered drinking level status during this period. Once administration of the drug was stopped, the animals returned to their original drinking ways, but never overshot that mark.

Currently, there are three drugs to treat alcohol dependency, all with side effects, including naltrexone, the most effective of the three, naltrexone (it causes lowering of the patient’s appetite). In this grim scenario, the new drug brings fresh hope. In fact, this is an already existing drug (developed by Pfizer) that has been used to fight nicotine addiction. It is called varenicline and is sold under the brand name Chantix.

Conducted by a team led by Dr. Selena Bartlett, Director of the Preclinical Development Group at the USCF affiliated Gallo Clinic and Research Center, the study itself has been hailed as one full of promise. According to Dr. Bartlett, the drug would work because research has shown that as much as 85% of alcohol-dependent people are nicotine-dependent as well. The new drug would make it possible to get two birds with one stone – get people to chuck their nicotine habit and also keep them away from alcohol.

The success of the drug on animals has prompted calls for clinical trials to start, so researchers can determine the actual degree of effectiveness of the drug on human subjects. The trials would be done by Dr. Bartlett’s team at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, in association with Markus Heilig. The results of the study are being published online this week, by "The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."