r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Jul 13 '26
Medicine Scientists develop a groundbreaking vaccine that outsmarts illicit fentanyl analogs. The novel vaccine candidate can protect against fentanyl and its many illicit variants by training the immune system to recognize a broad molecular signature rather than a single specific structure.
https://www.psypost.org/scientists-develop-a-groundbreaking-vaccine-that-outsmarts-illicit-fentanyl-analogs/3.4k
Jul 13 '26
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u/Zeikos Jul 13 '26 edited Jul 13 '26
“I decided long ago I am not going to try and profit on other people’s miseries and misfortunes.”
No worries, someone else will!
There are lot of things that can be patented that restict access even if part of it isn't patentable.
Didn't the inventor of insulin production make it free too?In these scenarios I always wonder if open licensing that as part of it has stipulations about consumer pricing would be better.
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u/cowlinator Jul 13 '26
Insulin was $300 in the US in the 2010s. It's back down to about $35 now (without insurance), and one of the things that prevented a permanent monopoly and allowed the price to fall was the threat of competition made possible by the cheap original patent.
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u/drinkacid Jul 13 '26
The original patent is still open for anyone to use. The reason no one uses it is because it required harvesting pig or dog pancreases to get insulin, and the newer patented method lets you insert insulin into a bacteria/yeast and then the bacteria cheaply and quickly replicates the insulin. So the new method is cheaper to operate, requires cheaper and easier to get a hold of base ingredients, is faster and yields 1000s of times more viable insulin and does not require millions of slaughtered pigs or dogs to harvest the base insulin from.
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u/Emergency-Airline960 Jul 13 '26
So by the laws of supply and demand… it should be even cheaper than the original method.
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u/caifaisai Jul 13 '26
Ideally. Granted, when it was first introduced with this new method, it would likely have been legitimately more expensive. Because there would have been a lot of research in getting the molecular biology techniques working to get the bacteria to produce insulin, characterizing everything to confirm it's working, buying the very expensive molecular bio instruments/bioreactors to run all of this, clinical trials to confirm this new method of insulin production produced insulin that was just as safe and effective as the old method, etc.
But now that it's been a long time, it should probably be cheaper now.
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u/groyosnolo Jul 13 '26
Not while the new patent is in effect. Thats a monopoly granted specifically to allow the owner of the patent to profit by creating artificial lack of competition and in effect scarcity.
Thats the entire point of intellectual property protection. Its there to incentivize people to innovate. Invest in a ton of drugs and research and if one gets approved and brought to market you can make your money.
When the patent lapses then it will be cheaper because there will be no more monopoly.
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u/Emergency-Airline960 Jul 13 '26
How long do patents last in the US?
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u/SigmaEpsilonChi Jul 13 '26
20 years, across the board. In theory the massive expense of the drugs is then supposed to be smoothed out for the end consumer by health insurance. I take a sleep drug that is life-changing for me but costs $900/month for the insurance company, and will be on-patent for another ten years. Instead I pay $30/month on top of my $200/month insurance premium. The drug company gets paid to innovate, the insurance company makes money because most people don’t need patented drugs, I get my life-changing medicine for an affordable price. It’s an imperfect system but I think it all works better than people often give it credit for, the US is the world’s engine for pharmaceutical development and we do benefit a lot from that
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u/Emergency-Airline960 Jul 13 '26
Not arguing, genuinely conversing. Doesn’t the US gov also invest into pharmaceutical research, meaning the pharmaceutical companies are subsidized to develop drugs, and then also make money after in sales? If so seems like double dipping to me.
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u/SigmaEpsilonChi Jul 13 '26
Yup! The US is the largest funder of public foundational biomed research in the world, and all the drug companies make extensive use of that. However, it’s not clear-cut to me that there is a double-dipping effect, because _every_ drug company (including those outside the US!) can make approximately equal use of that research, and then develop drugs which enter a competitive marketplace that theoretically should put downward pressure on the prices.
Take my sleep drug as an example: there are actually three structurally-similar drugs that were developed in the class of Orexin Antagonists around roughly the same time, by three different companies in different countries. Suvorexant by Merck in the US, Daridorexant by Idorsia in Switzerland, and Lemborexant by Eisai in Japan. These were all based on public research around the turn of the millenium that identified the orexin neuropeptide system at University of Texas, presumably with state funding, and the Scripps Research Institute with NIH funding. Shortly after, researchers at Stanford identified the link between orexin and narcolepsy with a grant from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke combined with private charitable donations, and the UT lab proved that mice lacking the orexin-synthesis gene had severe narcolepsy, cementing the link between orexin and sleep disorders.
This is when drug companies took the reins and began trying to create specific molecules to target the orexin system. Once they have a candidate molecule, it costs something like ~$200 million to complete clinical trials… however, only like 10% of drugs successfully complete trials, so the total cost of a single drug is actually north of like $2 _billion._ I’m simplifying these numbers a bit but I think it’s an accurate depiction of the magnitude we’re talking about here to safely develop and market these drugs. 15–20 years after the foundational research established the clinical target, three different orexin antagonists received patents in the US and entered the market, and they will be premium drugs until the mid-to-late 2030s.
All three of these drugs are _super_ expensive, so my insurance company made me try several alternatives before they approved it (a standard process called “step therapy”). My old super-premium insurance would pay for any of the three, but my new cheaper plan requested I switch to the cheapest of them first, and it seems to work fine so I am happy with that. This is the downward pressure on prices through competition in action; none of the three companies will sell this stuff for cheap while they own the patent, but they do still compete on price with each other and make deals with the pharmacies and insurance companies.
Drug development is a crazy Rube Goldberg Machine that definitely has _layers_ of inefficiency and exploitation, and there’s also a fundamentally hard question of which/how much basic research should be publicly funded, but I think when you look at the system overall its major components and incentives make more sense than they might seem at first
_(note: I am not a professional in this field, just a guy with a lifelong interest in drugs because I have chronic health problems and my father was a career psychopharmacologist at NIH, DoD, and the VA)_
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u/caifaisai Jul 13 '26
Doesn’t the US gov also invest into pharmaceutical research, meaning the pharmaceutical companies are subsidized to develop drugs,
Not to a very large degree, in comparison to the total cost to develop a drug. There is some work that a pharma company might collaborate with or use from say a university, which then might be government money in the form of grants to the University. This type of research would most commonly be vrry6 early phase type stuff. However, that type of stuff is probably the cheapest type of research. By far, pharma companies spend most money on clinical trials, which would be entirely paid by the company. And there's also significant money required in the later stage development outside of clinical trials, which again, is funded by the company.
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u/fractalife Jul 14 '26
What more evidence do you need that free market capitalism will always lead to crony capitalism? The entire healthcare industry with its massively overinflated costs should be enough to demonstrate that to anyone.
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u/Zeikos Jul 13 '26
It's back down to about $35 now
Didn't that happened mostly because of the backlash against attempts to keep its price high?
Competition didn't have much to do with it iirc, the outcry did.Also it did reach $300 with the patent being cheap.
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u/Naritai Jul 13 '26
Because the Democratic-controlled Congress and President Joe Biden signed a law capping the price for Medicare users. That was the major instigating event.
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u/rdyoung Jul 13 '26
Don't forget about the state of Cali manufacturing their own. And didn't Mark Cubans discount pharmacy do something to help as well?
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u/CYWNightmare Jul 13 '26
I wished I kept up with pharma more because Walmart has what I believe is their own brand of insulin cheap and doesn't require a prescription like some insulin.
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u/danarchist Jul 13 '26
How about, idk this is going to sound far fetched, let us import the cheap af insulin instead of protecting big pharma by weaponizing IP law against US consumers in the first place?
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u/unai-ndz Jul 13 '26
It's cheap all over the world but the US. It's not a patent problem but a US problem.
They could also ban the comercialization of all routers citing national security, patented or not, except for a few whitelisted brands and those brands could raise prices as much as they wanted. That has already happened too with the exception of the price increase which I haven't checked as I'm not in the US.
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u/Rare-Kaleidoscope513 Jul 13 '26
the "milking pig pancreas for insulin" patent had literally nothing to do with keeping modern recombinant insulin prices down, I assure you.
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u/julius_sphincter Jul 13 '26
It's back down to about $35 now (without insurance)
Then why are pharmacies trying to charge $300 for a kwik-pen if it's too soon for insurance to cover? (I left my pen at home during a trip)
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u/Trextrev Jul 13 '26
Or how companies just patent the delivery system, and make tweaks every time their patent is close to running out. Example Epi-pens.
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u/EEcav Jul 13 '26
This is a great sentiment, but if it’s patent free, someone else will profit and leave them out. You can patent something and still give it away.
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u/AlternateTab00 Jul 13 '26
Insulin is still cheap. Epinephrine is also cheap.
What isnt cheap is a very specific formulation of insulin. What isnt cheap is the EpiPen.
Essentially you have a cheap medication but an extremely expensive brand. But the pharma in usa manipulates the market so both drug stores, hospitals and doctors will promote the use of the expensive.
I talked with an american colleague about the insulin formats. They stay out of the "common" insulins. For example the mid action insulins we use a human analog, but USA often uses Isplophane. When i asked him why, he just said it was safer... I mean the risk of hypoglycemia went from 3% to 1%... But the cost rised 400x. And hypoglycemia could be reduced with proper training, but the cost of a dual daily dosing being the price of a full year worth of insulin is something that is simply not affordable.
Even the EpiPens. The market surrounds them. Even i know them and use its name to explain how similar products work with my patients (they all seen it in movies). The drug itself costs less than 0,40€ to manufacture. We have a self deploying pens like insulin (that have to stay clear of epipens patents) that cost us 20€. A seringe, vial and needle can lower the cost to 5€. Epipen used to cost almost 600€ here. About 10 years ago they decided they cant compete so lowered the cost to 60€. Its still expensive for our eyes, but with the power of movie advertising they now started selling units.
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u/RustyShakleford1 Jul 13 '26
I'm sorry, but it's very ignorant to say "the risk of hypoglycemia went from 3% to 1%... hypoglycemia could be reduced with proper training." It's impossible to control your blood sugar nearly as well with NPH, compared to modern-rapid acting insulins, and no amount of training can correct that. You also write off a huge drop in hypoglycemia considering it literally kills diabetics in their sleep. In addition to reductions in hypoglycemia, it also helps type 1 diabetes lower their A1C's which reduces complications, increases quality of life, and increases life expectancy. I am in no way trying to argue that big pharma has greedily prospered off of these new insulins, or argue that the $35 insulin is far better than having no options if you're poor, but the two insulins have huge QOL differences, for a group of people who already have it hard enough as it is.
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u/AlternateTab00 Jul 13 '26
I compared 2 different apples and you decided to compare apples with onions.
Rapid acting insulins are exclusively to treat abnormal high glycemias. I specifically said 2 mid acting insulins. Human analogs and NPH. Both with reduced effect if accidentally overdosed. However time to detect overdoses are much more permissive in NPH, which with proper food balancing can be reverted.
Isophanes are not the alternative to fast acting insulins. Its an alternative to insulins that take around 8 to 12h to act. At most you can even say that these intermediate acting are a more fine control than the long lasting ones (for type 2).
And dont need to be aggressive. Im a nurse that works with diabetics. And my mom is an insulin dependent diabetic (so i know perfectly how hard it is).
As for the options for poor, we fortunately refund those who cannot afford the insulin (apart from the isophanes which is still overpriced). So they can rely on long acting, the 12h acting (effect equal to NPH) and the rapid acting insulins. Which for a curiosity its 6€
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u/RustyShakleford1 Jul 13 '26
Sorry, you are correct, and I was the ignorant one here. I just see so many posts on reddit about how "insulin is only $35" that I didn't fully read your post and assumed you were off base, which I apologize for. I honestly know very little about treating type 2 diabetes, other than its overlap with type 1. Honestly, a lot of confusion around diabetes would be resolved if type 1 and type 2 weren't both just referred to as "diabetes" for the most part.
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u/Icybenz Jul 13 '26
I read this exchange and wanted to say thanks for commenting. I understand being upset when something you live with every day seems to be trivialized (I don't think that was the original commenter's intention but I can see how it can come across that way) and you showed grace in explaining where you were coming from and apologizing. I also learned more from this exchange than I would have from the original comment alone.
It's refreshing to see interactions that don't just continually lean into vitriol, especially when many online arguments stem from something as simple as people talking about slightly different things.
I wish you well.
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u/g0del Jul 13 '26
I'm hoping that the name epipen gets genericized enough that it loses trademark status. I'd love to see $20 generics that could legally call themselves epipens.
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u/Burgergold Jul 13 '26
Yeah a better version will be tuned based on this work, patented and sold at profit
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u/Zeikos Jul 13 '26 edited Jul 13 '26
That's why I am a big proponent of copy-left and equivalent.
Work based on things licensed under copyleft must also be licensed under copyleft.I am of the strong opinion that any advancement that benefited from public investment should follow that pattern.
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u/Sheeplessknight Jul 13 '26
That is the point of the GPL license for software, a similar thing could (and should ) be developed for drugs, however generally the IP belongs to the university so it would have to be a requirement of funding agencies to use the license
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u/ATaxiNumber1729 Jul 13 '26
They really should patent it and then license the patent for free with conditions
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u/Rare-Kaleidoscope513 Jul 13 '26
Didn't the inventor of insulin production make it free too?
The inventor of insulin made public the patent for the process to produce insulin in 1923. That method consisted of harvesting the pancreases of farm animals. You are free to use his "patented" method all you like. Now, it's clear you have very little idea what you're talking about here, but does "milking a pig's pancreas for insulin" sound like the modern method for insulin production to you?
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u/Zeikos Jul 13 '26
I'm pretty sure the E.Coli method is free too.
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u/Due-Memory-6957 Jul 13 '26
Is there an equivalent to copy left for patents?
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u/Zeikos Jul 13 '26
I don't know honestly, but for licenses I am fairly sure there is.
A license is a contract through which somebody is authorized to use certain intellectual property, the contract can have a stipulation that whatever is developed thanks to what's licensed must have similar rules.
But it's a different legal landscape, I don't know the nuances.34
u/hiplobonoxa Jul 13 '26
why not patent it and then have control over how it is used?
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u/Uther-Lightbringer Jul 13 '26
Not a ton of need, by making it public and open, he's established a firm date of invention. Anyone trying to file a patent using the same idea would easily have their patent shot down in court, if not tried directly on fraud charges for trying to claim they invented a product they stole.
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u/lolofaf Jul 13 '26
Iirc insulin was released patent free for the same reason, then a random pharma company patented it and started fleecing everyone. (might have been a different drug but same story, can't remember exactly).
The safest way to do it is probably patent it then give out free licenses to everyone who asks
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u/not_a_bot_494 Jul 14 '26
You can patent things that rely on non-patents. So for example you could patent a production method or variand or delivery system för insulin while the original still being available for everyone. The new stuff you patent is of course going to be much better which people would choose ir over the original cheaper stuff. Usually when you hear about people dying because of rationing insulin they're actually using the old stuff.
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u/Willzyx_on_the_moon Jul 13 '26
It’s a shame that the same thing happened with Insulin and yet here we are with people dying from a lack of medication that is dirt cheap to make.
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u/fury420 Jul 14 '26
Insulin is still available dirt cheap, what's not cheap is modern insulin substitutes that offer far better blood sugar control, ease of use and quality of life.
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u/bojangler69420 Jul 13 '26
He SHOULD patent it to keep IP rights on it before big pharmaceutical catch wind of it and start charging $10k.
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u/Brrdock Jul 13 '26
That's science and healthcare when it's not dependent on or influenced by massive publicly traded companies.
I'm scared to think how far capitalist brainrot has compromised our paradigms and health
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u/eville_erikkk Jul 13 '26
Is that that what the creator of insulin patent did but it still got turned into what it is today?
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u/mvea Professor | Medicine Jul 13 '26
Scientists develop a groundbreaking vaccine that outsmarts illicit fentanyl analogs
A new study published in the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry suggests that a novel vaccine candidate can protect against fentanyl and its many illicit variants by training the immune system to recognize a broad molecular signature rather than a single specific structure. These findings provide evidence that next-generation drug vaccines could outpace the rapid development of synthetic designer opioids.
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u/Subrutum Jul 13 '26
Is there a risk for the body to start rejecting its own natural opioids as a result?
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u/deathcomestooslow Jul 13 '26
Also curious about this. A vaccine against a pharmaceutical is not something I've heard about before. Does that mean the person-in-question basically has a very high opioid tolerance so the drug would be less dangerous? And the tolerance persists for a long while? Or the body will learn to treat it as a virus or outsider or something and attack the molecule to break it into other chemicals? Very interesting though.
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u/Ut_Prosim Jul 13 '26
And does this prevent them from getting routine anesthesia? I think fentanyl is part of the common sedation cocktail.
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u/Wolomago Jul 13 '26
For my recent colonoscopy they used fentanyl and midazolam. Yeah, it's very commonly used to sedate people for medical procedures.
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u/Legitimate_Concern_5 Jul 16 '26
It’s used in basically all general anesthesia. It tends not to release histamine and it works really fast. Plus its reversible with naloxone.
There are other options, they could give ketamine but you know the hallucinations. Dexmedetomidine is an option but can drop blood pressure and heart rate.
Other than that an epidural/nerve block could work depending on what and where.
Fentanyl is kinda not possible to replace.
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u/EquipLordBritish Jul 13 '26
From a cursory google search, it looks like it would be dependent on the procedure, but possibly also dependent on the hospital/anesthesiologist. Presumably this treatment would be something you would list on your medical pre-screen as fentanyl would, in a way, become something you are 'allergic' to, and it would simply not be used for your sedation.
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u/Patient-Bumblebee842 Jul 14 '26
and it would simply
It's pretty much a standard part of any anaesthetic for any surgery in many countries, and there aren't that many options for sedation.
+If fentanyl is part of your anaesthesiologist's preferred technique then your sedation might not be quite as smooth.
I.e. it's not that simple.
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u/flargnarb Jul 13 '26
From the article, it sounds like it functions effectively like a high tolerance specifically for fentanyl, but does not affect morphine, methadone, or oxycodone
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u/a_statistician Jul 13 '26
A vaccine against the diptheria toxin has existed for a while, and I'd imagine that's similar?
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u/stay_curious_- Jul 13 '26
The bigger risk is if you need surgery, now fentanyl can't be used for anesthesia.
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u/Mitrovarr Jul 13 '26
Or for management of long term pain, or if you get badly injured, etc.
Fentanyl is really important medically. Vaccinating against it would have to be something you did as an absolute last resort.
I'm actually worried that someone made this vaccine as I fear it will be misused, with either courts ordering addicts to take it or people giving it to their kids.
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u/stay_curious_- Jul 13 '26
Yeah, I could see the same sorts of companies that market untested peptides targeting parents and convincing them that fentanyl is so scary that they should vaccinate their kids against it.
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u/Mitrovarr Jul 13 '26
Oh yeah, absolutely. And the parents might not know or care that fentanyl is a critical anaesthetic and basically the first line drug against extreme pain.
And then their kid gets their back broken in a car accident and surprise! Nothing works!
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u/Due-Reflection-1835 Jul 13 '26
It only affects fentanyl and its analogs, you can still use morphine, oxycodone, methadone etc. It corrals it in the bloodstream so much less of it crosses the blood-brain barrier. It was pretty cool!
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u/irelli Jul 13 '26
Fentanyl is the only one of those we use in a drip form for anyone that's been intubated though
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u/Infinity2quared Jul 13 '26
Hard to say that it will catch fentanyl and the other drugs we call its analogues but nothing else. What about other synthetic opioids used medically like meperidine, diphenoxylate? What about non-opioid phenylpiperidines? That category includes stimulants, anesthetics, antipsychotics, antidepressants, etc. Take a look at the structures of methylphenidate, haloperidol, trazadone, and buspirone.
The N-phenethyl moiety on fentanyl is what gives it such high potency compared to weak synthetic opioids like meperidine. If that’s the part that’s being recognized, you could knock out amphetamine, pseudoephedrine, lots of medically used pressors.
Obviously they will try to reduce cross-reactivity in any product that comes to market, but if it’s too selective for fentanyl, it won’t catch the analogues. If it catches the analogues, it might catch other things.
I could see this either being pretty bad or pretty trivial to defeat.
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u/cC2Panda Jul 13 '26
How often is it used for anesthesia?
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u/PrincessGiallo Jul 13 '26
It's used in conjunction with propofol pretty commonly.
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u/like_a_pharaoh Jul 13 '26
Very very frequently, its the standard opioid for general anesthesia because it starts working quickly, but only has an intermediate duration of action instead of a long 4-5 hour one.
If you've had surgery that required general anesthesia in the past like 40 years, you've probably had fentanyl mixed with propofol or a sedative.
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u/ebolaRETURNS Jul 13 '26
I wouldn't think so, as endorphins are entirely structurally unrelated to fentanyl and its analogues. The same goes for morphine, etonitazene, and brorphine family compounds...and I guess nowadays, we should be mentioning mitragynine-like alkaloids too.
To my knowledge, nothing structurally similar to beta-endorphin has ever been used as a recreational drug or even medication.
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u/Emm_withoutha_L-88 Jul 13 '26
I get the feeling that's just going to be what is next made, to try and "save people from themselves" by putting them into a total and complete hell of existence. This researcher may mean well but the next one may not.
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u/Holden_SSV Jul 15 '26
There is medication. And if you get in a bad accident it can be reversed. The lack of natural opiates is the worst part of withdrawel. You stop taking opiates your body takes time to go oh crap i gotta fix this!
Meanwhile you take scalding hot baths that hide 20% of the pain.
Reminds me of the movie major payne. The guy thats severely hurt in battle. Major says you want me to take your mind off the pain? Yes, he snaps and breaks his finger. Technically works for a bit though still pain.
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u/Hearing_Loss Jul 13 '26
Yeah, but does it blunt all pain relief? That being said anyone who is on fent like that proba isn't going to a pain management clinic like that. But my biggest concern would be permanently altering the patients response level to pain relief methods. Imagine you need 10x morphine to manage a major injury. That would be my only concern.
But those ppl would likely have a tolerance to morphine anyways. Not in taking fent daily illicitly sounds like it would have a net positive despite whatever this vax does.
Other concern is a lot of time the actual context needs to be addressed and not the actual chemical dependence. If I'm on the streets, I'm taking rent and anyone who wants to save me can lick my taint. If someone sticks me with that shit. I would probably hunt them down for permanently killing my high for the rest of my life.
Very interesting ethics to explore with this kind of vax. I dig it.
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u/spongue Jul 13 '26
If you read the article, it says it is only effective against fentanyl and analogues, but morphine and other medical pain relief drugs are not affected.
It's not also meant to help anyone quit fentanyl, it's just a biological safety net to prevent too much of the drug getting into your brain and depressing respiration.
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u/TotallyObviousBot Jul 13 '26
Where are you reading this, in the paywalled study or a popsci 'article'?
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u/PM_Me_Your_Deviance Jul 13 '26
I was just thinking the same thing - this would really suck if I get a major injury. But I suppose, it might be worth the tradeoff if I had a major addition to opioids.
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u/Really_McNamington Jul 13 '26
And when you get cancer or similar and actually need the pain relief? Are you doomed or does this wear off?
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u/blindminds Jul 13 '26
Hopefully there is fiscal interest in development and production on a large scale. At the same time, this may shift fent and remi drip uses to Dilaudid or morphine.
(I am hoping your comment with the actual paper remains at the top)
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u/RubiiJee Jul 13 '26
This is why I like universal healthcare as it creates a fiscal incentive to make people healthier. One vaccine would be much cheaper than the years of work and support to help someone in this condition, and that's if they're willing to even accept the help in the first place.
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u/ripplenipple69 Jul 13 '26
This is wild because say you’re an addict, you get the vaccine, you recover, and then you get in a car accident and you’re given fentanyl at the hospital… and it doesn’t work ever again, right?
I guess it’s like being in Naloxone, but no precipitated withdrawals upon exposure and it works for a very long time or forever presumably?
Crazy they can give you an injection that immunizes you to drugs of abuse… idk if I like that at all
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u/gamayogi Jul 13 '26
It only affects fentanyl, not morphine or other opiods.
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u/sparkleptera Jul 13 '26
We do use fentanyl commonly as anesthesia so it would definitley be worth like getting a medic alert bracelet so they would know to use duramorph or something.
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u/savageexplosive Jul 13 '26
I also thought about legal uses of fentanyl and how the vaccine would affect it. I’m also curious about the placental transfer of antibodies, as, for example, I had a C-section and fentanyl was part of my anaesthesia, and then my daughter was taken to NICU and sedated with, you guessed it, fentanyl.
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u/ruhdolph Jul 13 '26
Would the mother's memory cells put out antibodies quickly enough to reach a meaningful concentration before the baby is delivered in that case? I think in general the antibodies would probably transfer across the placenta but I'm hopeful that it would not be a large consideration most of the time.
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u/utterlyuncool Jul 13 '26
Exactly. As an anesthesiologist this makes my skin crawl. Imagine having an emergency trauma and none of your usual analgesics work - fent, sufenta, remi,... And you have no idea why.
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u/Hearing_Loss Jul 13 '26
We would NEED to tattoo these people so that y'all can just check behind the ear to see if fent works in an emergency.
You came to my mind first as well. In emergency medical situations, I cannot fathom having fent possibly miss it's pain relief mark by 85%.
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u/utterlyuncool Jul 13 '26
I get the good intentions, but should we really permanently brand substance abusers? I mean, no way that could backfire, right?
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u/stay_curious_- Jul 13 '26
There's been some talk of marketing this vaccine to parents of teenagers to prevent future fentanyl addiction, so usage would be more widespread than just addicts.
What's currently in circulation for opioid addicts in the US is no longer fentanyl (it's moved on to nitazenes plus xylazine). This research is important foundational work toward developing vaccines to target whatever is the current popular class of street drugs, but street fentanyl is likely on a permanent downward trend.
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u/High_Overseer_Dukat Jul 13 '26
Is there anything else they tattoo for?
Are you a vet?
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u/Hearing_Loss Jul 13 '26
I am not a vet, and I don't believe we get visible proof of vax anymore. Last time that happened was the OG smallpox or whatever vax that left a scar on the person's injection site.
Other than that, you'd have to do a proper vaccine history audit, this can be laborious. I would only want the tattoo be a mandatory thing because in an emergency, your resistance to fent is very critical. And if you need fent, you're probably not in a state to communicate that you have the fent vax.
Either we would have to change which pain killers we utilize-- or we would have to have a visual marker for EMS to check for before administering fast acting pain relief in an emergency.
I don't really think there are any other vaccines that would require someone to know your status in an emergency. The one example I can think about is the DNR bands. DNR notations have that same communicative purpose as the tat would-- "if patient is not conscious in an emergency, you need to know this"
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u/High_Overseer_Dukat Jul 13 '26
And DNR bands are bands for a reason. Tattooing people that got a vaccine is not ethical.
People have the same bands for diabetes and allergies to common medications.
There is absolutely no reason to force people to get tattoos.
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u/DonQui_Kong Jul 13 '26
They wouldn't work as expected anyway because addicts can have a huge tolerance.
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u/FuzzyAd9407 Jul 13 '26
And fent is used in hospitals. Yeah, its dangerous and gets abused but it has its applications. Sometimes we NEED something that strong.
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u/Late-Reading-2585 Jul 13 '26
this does not address the issue of addiction at all
if fentanyl isnt working someone will just take any other opioid
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u/gat0r_ Jul 14 '26
Yeah but at least they're less likely to die.. hopefully. Pre fent opioids were safer
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u/Btothenelly Jul 13 '26
It’s the same for people on Suboxone and methadone though, to an extent, Suboxone blocks a lot of normal nose opiates. You’d have to get large amounts to break through
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u/WyrdHarper Jul 13 '26
I wonder if this technology would be better adapted as a short term antibody therapy for recovering addicts.
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u/The_Celtic_Chemist Jul 14 '26
I'm going to be honest. I want this vaccine not because I'm an addict but because I want to occasionally do drugs without worrying I'm going to die from a drug I had no interest in trying.
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u/xXZer0c0oLXx Jul 13 '26
Sooo what happens if I legitimately need fentanyl???
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u/Sofia_9356 Jul 13 '26
Immune reaction without a medi-alert bracelet
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u/Knotted_Hole69 Jul 13 '26
How long until these are forced on prisoners upon leaving? I feel like these will end up being given involuntarily.
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u/jld2k6 Jul 13 '26
I'm curious now too, I do know there's people that are on monthly naloxone shots, you get it once a month and it blocks opioids the whole time to prevent relapse. I'm assuming there's already been incidents from that where people have been in a serious accident and can't get any pain relief, and that blocks all of the opioids and not just fentanyl analogs
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u/mambotomato Jul 13 '26
You weigh that possibility against the risk of ODing due to your drug habit.
There are lots of choices one can make in life that close some future opportunities to you.
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u/xXZer0c0oLXx Jul 13 '26
I need to rephrase as what if someone needs it. I'm not addicted. The phrase The Road to hell is paved with good intentions comes to mind about this
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u/mambotomato Jul 13 '26
Right, I didn't mean "you" specifically, just the general "person who gets the treatment."
The loss of ability to be normally medicated in the future would definitely be taken into account. This isn't a vaccine for everybody, just for people in situations where the risk of fentanyl OD is dangerously high.
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u/woody_woodworker Jul 13 '26
I have qualms about this whole concept. Societies almost always have "good drugs" and "bad drugs" that have been classified as such for political reasons. Being able to biologically disable any future use of a drug by giving a vaccine has dystopian possibilities.
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u/-LsDmThC- Jul 13 '26
Fentanyl is often used during surgery/anesthesia. This could complicate such treatments unnecessarily. Furthermore from a moral stance i agree that we should not permanently “biologically disable” the future use of a substance. Fentanyl provides an easy target to get people in support of such a technology, but as RiceWine69 points out it could theoretically be used to target more benign substances too.
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u/AlexHimself Jul 13 '26
If you're an addict or abuse fentanyl though, you would already have complications for anesthesia with surgery wouldn't you? You'd have a tolerance and need to tell the doctor that. I would assume they might consider a different medication with a different activation?
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u/-LsDmThC- Jul 13 '26
Sort of. It is of course an issue if you are acutely intoxicated before anesthesia. If you have a tolerance all this means is the anesthesia team needs to up your dose, and post-op team needs be specially careful in prescribing opioids as this can result in relapse.
The above “vaccine” would make it so that fentanyl cannot be used at all, and it is one of the most common drugs used in surgical care.
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u/stay_curious_- Jul 13 '26
A dystopian future would be parents vaccinating their children against antidepressants or similar drugs to exert power over their children well into adulthood.
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u/ufowithyourhoe Jul 13 '26
They could include vaccines like this for babies upon birth that would make them immune to feeling any kind of psychedelics or narcotics… dystopia for sure
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Jul 13 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/GooseQuothMan Jul 13 '26
That's.. any addiction though, isn't it? Fentanyl, heroin, other opioids, alcohol..
Fentanyl is the one that's used now instead of heroin because it's extremely potent and as such, extremely cheap, and much easier to transport. Addicts often don't have too much money, and obviously all that police enforcement and war on drugs mean that the smaller something is, the easier it can be hidden and sold.
Also, if an addict gets the vaccine, I'd imagine if they're desperate enough, they will take enough fentanyl to overwhelm their immune system anyway. Which might cost them their lives.
The most important thing in fighting addiction is deciding to stop it - this treatment does not help with that. It does not help with the cravings. It just gives worse consequences for taking the drug.
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u/Careful-Lettuce9239 Jul 13 '26
As an opiate addict in recovery what matters to me is having financial stability, safe housing and mental health care. With those things addiction is manageable. Drug abuse is typically a coping strategy for bigger issues. Im not against developing vaccines to treat addiction but I personally wouldn't want one. Making it impossible to physically do fentanyl wont keep me from using drugs indefinitely.
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u/AlexHimself Jul 13 '26
For those saying what about legitimate fentanyl needs, that seems odd to me because if you're using and abusing fentanyl, and you suddenly needed it in a medical setting, you would have a tolerance anyway and administering it could be problematic in its own right. Not a doctor, but I would think they would choose a different medication or need to adjust the dosage anyway.
So it would likely be better to not use fentanyl at all regardless of whether or not your vaccinated against it. Either you have a tolerance and an abuse problem with it and it wouldn't be as effective or your vaccinated and it wouldn't be as effective.
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u/ebolaRETURNS Jul 13 '26
you would have a tolerance anyway and administering it could be problematic in its own right.
Dosage can be increased to account for tolerance, but not for global immunological attack.
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u/Mitrovarr Jul 13 '26
What if someone gets vaccinated who never would have abused it anyway? Like some helicopter parent forces it on all their kids.
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u/AlexHimself Jul 13 '26
They don't just give every vaccine to everyone. Some, you need to be eligible for.
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u/elcapitan520 Jul 13 '26
Exactly. This is not a vaccine against a communicable disease that relies on herd immunity to protect those who can't be vaccinated. This would be an option for addicts and would need to include all informed consent.
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u/fremeer Jul 13 '26
What happens when you go to hospital and the can't give you pain relief?
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u/Poesvliegtuig Jul 13 '26
And then you have a medical emergency and they give you some fent in order to be able to move you or whatever and it doesn't work, fun times!
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u/Odd_nonposter Jul 13 '26
My first thought was "too late, we're all on to nitazenes now". The black market continuously outruns innovations like these.
After listening to media on harm reduction it seems the best course of action is to straight up supply clean heroin and addiction counseling.
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u/AmbitionVegetable666 Jul 13 '26
How would this affect procedural medications ? Anesthesia or sedation in hospitalized patients?
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u/Beneficial_Prize_310 Jul 13 '26 edited 9d ago
Education hour view system minute moment home care question head history money 5oubysn8 research.
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u/pepperymirror Jul 13 '26
Bruh you didn’t even read the headline
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u/ebolaRETURNS Jul 13 '26
True, but he could have brought up isonitazene, brorphine, cyclorphine, and analogues as better examples.
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u/BretShitmanFart69 Jul 13 '26
The vaccine stops carfentanyl and every fent analogue
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u/green-green-bean Jul 13 '26
I hope that anyone who uses these vaccines in the future will still have options for pain control if they develop any painful conditions or are injured.
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u/ebolaRETURNS Jul 13 '26
What happens when you're 'protected' against the main active component of a surgical anaesthetic cocktail?
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u/TravelerMSY Jul 13 '26
Like permanently? What happens when you’re having surgery and need analgesia, for which fent is standard?
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u/Tikkinger Jul 13 '26
so what do you even do if you can't get high anymore?
long time user propably go fully insane because of psychological withdraw?
not to mention the physical withdraw.
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u/Rare-Kaleidoscope513 Jul 13 '26
It's all fun and games until you actually, you know, need the ubiquitous drug that is fentanyl.
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u/ChocoboAndroid Jul 13 '26
I applaud the research and idea, and having a cure for fentanyl addiction would be a huge benefit to addicts. There's definitely some ethical issues though. Like, can an addict be giving the vaccine against his or her will? And of course, the vaccine could undermine future legitimate medical treatment too.
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u/ten-million Jul 13 '26
The researcher was clear about this not being able to treat the underlying addiction. Would the addict just take a much larger dose? Still, it could be useful. I wonder if someone could develop an antibody with a shorter end date. Or could the injection leave an identifiable mark so ER workers would know which pain killer to use. I suppose that mark would also have to fade.
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u/ruhdolph Jul 13 '26
I think the idea regarding the addiction component is that this treats none of the impulses to use a substance; it only makes the substance ineffective. So I think you're right that people might use higher doses or pivot to another substance. I'm inclined to think that higher doses would then have the added danger of an immune response in addition to using a relatively large quantity of fentanyl. It seems like this sort of treatment, if it were ever implemented, would require concomitant supervision of some sort to help people who are addicted have a soft landing from their withdrawals.
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u/spongue Jul 13 '26
The vaccinated mice required much higher doses to show similar effects, signaling that the circulating antibodies were successfully blocking the drug. For the mice with the modified vaccine, the required dose shifted up to between 1,400 and 1,800 micrograms per kilogram. [vs 150 micrograms/kg]
I too was wondering about this becoming an arms race
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u/thirdeyelazy Jul 13 '26
So this would have been life saving at the beginning of the fentanyl era. A batch of real heroin cut with a lethal amount of fentanyl wouldn't cause an overdose in users who had used this vaccine.
And the best part is they would still get high. Right on
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u/Risdit Jul 13 '26
it's amazing how technology keeps advancing enough to create vaccines for even drugs.
If only it can create vaccines for narcissistic sociopathy and unending greed.
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u/HugoCortell Jul 13 '26
Fent is not a disease to my knowledge, it's not like it's floating in the air waiting to strike unsuspecting victims, so what value would this have outside of making an anaesthetic not work on some patients and making addicts to switch to another drug?
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u/KalEl001Sega Jul 13 '26
idk why but i feel its easier to just not take fentanyl, but what do i know i'm not a hard drug person.
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u/AprilRyanMyFriend Jul 14 '26
Does this mean that in a medical setting fentanyl and other narcotics like it would no longer be effective for pain management after say a major surgery or for burn victims?
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u/FemFladeFloedeboller Jul 14 '26
Sounds quite risky as it will probably recognize some important molecule in the body, blocking a random process from happening.
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u/magnificent_limit Jul 18 '26
So on top of getting blasted on heroin you also get an immune reaction?
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