In the New York Times Article, “Fast-Acting Depression Drug, Newly Approved, Could Help Millions,” written by Benedict Carey and released on March 5, 2019… it was said that a new drug called ketamine was approved by the FDA. This drug can act as an antidepressant  Although this new drug can be a faster and more effective drug, it can cause weird side effects, is cost full if your healthcare provider does not cover it, and has properties that are unknown and still not understood.

This article talks about how this new drug, ketamine, is an antidepressant, is fast acting and can be more effective than other antidepressants. This drug can mostly help those people that are harder to treat. A side effect that seemed to cause ‘out-of-body and hallucinogenic sensations.’ Ketamine is not going to be covered by most insurances so people will be paying out of pocket. There are some who are still skeptical and they voice their opinion on how unsure they are about the new drug. For example, a former FDA reviewer said, “But I’m skeptical of the hype because in this world it’s like Lucy holding the football for Charlie Brown: Each time we get our hopes up, the football gets pulled away,” (Carey 1). Another point the article makes is that those hard to treat people have given up hope that a new drug will help them. They would rather not try the drug because it can be a waste of time and that it may not work. Doctors and many others are hopeful that this drug is more so effective.

Ketamine being an unsure and having unknown properties is something that can be disturbing since it was already approved by the FDA. It would make it hard for people to trust this new medicine and for doctors to prescribe it to their patients. Its side effects include having hallucinations… the patients might have been better off taking a drug that takes more time and has fewer side effects than this drug. Ketamine is also an out of pocket cost in which those people who are hard to treat, cannot be relieved because of the expense. This makes it hard for people to feel mentally better.

This article about the drug, Ketamine, shows how it is this ‘newly discovered and effective drug’ but it also shows how even doctors and others that are involved with medicine are skeptical about this drug. Because of all the uncertainties, the FDA should not be approving drugs in which they are still skeptical and how there should be more research on those uncertainties.

 

 

 

 

 

Ethical Dilemmas in Scientific Research

 

Although many scientific research experiments may result in new discoveries that may be beneficial, not all scientific experiments are necessarily ethical. For example, in the article, ‘In China, Gene-Edited Babies Are the Latest in a String of Ethical Dilemmas’, it talks about how doctor He Jiankui, “created the world’s first genetically edited babies,” (Wee/Chen).

What I found to be more intriguing and shocking was how scientists in China have such a strong desire to succeed that they question everything after they have fone whichever experiment they wanted (Wee/Chen). Dr. He researches were being funded by the Southern University of Science and Technology and he had not told them specifically that he would be experimenting with babies to genetically edit them. It can be assumed that although he knew what kind of experiment he was doing, he did not want anyone to know because of it being an ethical dilemma in which it also might raise a question in Dr. He’s morality. This article ties chapters one and three, where chapter one talks about miscommunication with the public as well as other scientists, and chapter three which mentions the integrity that goes behind researching.

This article tends to have more a negative connotation of the morality of this research in which it can be commonly agreed. The thought that Dr. He, withheld information from the public, other scientists, and the university that was funding him to do what he wanted was unsettling. Thankfully his experiment was successful but it had not been, then it would’ve been at the cost of the babies that Dr. He had used. Also, the fact that the couple in which the man had HIV and the woman did not rely on the experiment that would be conducted where the doctor would genetically engineer their baby so that it is not vulnerable to the HIV infection. As mentioned in class, people tend to twist words to make it seem better when in reality there’s more to it. Dr. He made it seem to the couple that was more positive effects than negative. The man did not accept to sign up for the experiment because he thought it was unreliable. Another thing that was mentioned that can be agreed with, was that there should be updated rules/laws in which experiments should be investigated to see if it is ethical or not. This would definitely help reduce negative results from experiments tend to be unethical.

Works Cited

 

Wee, Sui-Lee and Elsie Chen. (2018, Nov. 30) In China, Gene-Edited Babies Are the Latest in a String of Ethical Dilemmas.  

 

 

For my Summary and Response, I chose a topic pertaining to Chemistry, ‘How Pasteur’s Artistic Insight Changed Chemistry’. This article talks about Louis Pasteur’s early life as an artist and how he insisted that chirality existed and because of this it can affect chemistry and importantly the human body. Chirality is a geometric form that certain molecules and ions have. Pasteur first began as an artist until his parents told him to chose a more serious career where he can make more money, After becoming a newly inexperienced scientist, at 24 years old, he discovers chirality after an accident that had occurred in a vat of wine.

Beforehand scientists were studying and were curious about how molecules were built and by seeing how crystals interacted with light, helped scientists know about their structure. Pasteur in his study found, ‘that the mirror-image crystals, together as a 50/50 mix in the solution, canceled each other’s ability to rotate polarized light,’ (Klein 3). Scientists beforehand were close to coming up with this conclusion but still hadn’t gotten there yet. Someone by the name of Dr. Gal thought Pasteur discovered this because of his artistry and how he never separated from it. After this discovery, he became a biologist and studied drugs that had two chiral shapes and how that can cause effects in the body negatively. An example is when doctors had given Thalidomide to a pregnant patient and because of the chiral shapes that can cause an effect, it harmed her child. Now companies are trying to separate the chiral drugs that they knew can cause harm to the human body. In this article, they give another example of how Ibuprofen contains the 50/50 mix of chiral molecules but it helps with pain with no negative effect.

An article similar to a certain subject that was discussed in class, scientists were trying to figure out how the structure of the molecules is. Pasteur was also curious about this and on his own, he was able to figure it out. There was a preconceived notion and mystery that other scientists were trying to find out and Pasteur took what the other scientists had known and studied it his way. His artistic skill contributed to how he was able to see the chiral shape which means his perspective was different than others. I believe it is important to have scientists publish their work with no concern for gaining recognition and praise for a new discovery because the sooner the public and other scientists know the better. Scientists can fill in the missing gap and create a breakthrough which can, in turn, benefit people. For example, new medicine can be created faster to save more lives.

It is also interesting how the artistic side of Pasteur gave him the advantage to see a new side that others could not have seen. It is always better to have different perspectives when it comes to research because it helps provide a faster solution and to correct certain things that may have been wrong. If scientists do not come together to share perspectives, it delays a new discovery for something important such as medicine for an illness or even a cure that could have helped ages ago when it was first discovered.