JAMA States: “Pay Attention: Ritalin Acts Much Like Cocaine”
The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) is not known for being friendly to alternative medicine. However, a recently published article (JAMA 2001;286(8):905-6), describes something many have known or suspected for a long time: that Ritalin acts a lot like cocaine.
The article states that, although Ritalin has been prescribed to treat ADHD for forty years, “psychiatrists and pharmacologists have never known how it worked.” Quite a shocking admission, considering that an estimated 6 million American children are on the drug, some as young as four.
Through advanced imaging techniques, researchers found what the article calls “startling results”: that “instead of being a less potent transport inhibitor than cocaine, methylphenidate (Ritalin) was more potent,” and that “the data clearly show that the notion that Ritalin is a weak stimulant is completely incorrect.” The only significant difference between the two drugs is that Ritalin ìtakes about an hour to raise dopamine levels, whereas inhaled or injected cocaine hits the brain in seconds.
Finally, the author states that “the long-term dopamine effects of taking methylphenidate (Ritalin) for years, as many do, are unknown.” You may draw your own conclusions.
