(12 reviews) Author: Nicolas Rasmussen ISBN : 9780814776391 New from $15.48 Format: PDFLife in the Fast Lane: The author on the CHE
Uppers. Crank. Bennies. Dexies. Greenies. Black Beauties. Purple Hearts. Crystal. Ice. And, of course, Speed. Whatever their street names at the moment, amphetamines have been an insistent force in American life since they were marketed as the original antidepressants in the 1930s. On Speed tells the remarkable story of their rise, their fall, and their surprising resurgence. Along the way, it discusses the influence of pharmaceutical marketing on medicine, the evolving scientific understanding of how the human brain works, the role of drugs in maintaining the social order, and the centrality of pills in American life. Above all, however, this is a highly readable biography of a very popular drug. And it is a riveting story.
Incorporating extensive new research, On Speed describes the ups and downs (fittingly, there are mostly ups) in the history of amphetamines, and their remarkable pervasiveness. For example, at the same time that amphetamines were becoming part of the diet of many GIs in World War II, an amphetamine-abusing counterculture began to flourish among civilians. In the 1950s, psychiatrists and family doctors alike prescribed amphetamines for a wide variety of ailments, from mental disorders to obesity to emotional distress. By the late 1960s, speed had become a fixture in everyday life: up to ten percent of Americans were thought to be using amphetamines at least occasionally.
Although their use was regulated in the 1970s, it didn't take long for amphetamines to make a major comeback, with the discovery of Attention Deficit Disorder and the role that one drug in the amphetamine family—Ritalin—could play in treating it. Today’s most popular diet-assistance drugs differ little from the diet pills of years gone by, still speed at their core. And some of our most popular recreational drugs—including the "mellow" drug, Ecstasy—are also amphetamines. Whether we want to admit it or not, writes Rasmussen, we’re still a nation on speed.
- Paperback: 352 pages
- Publisher: NYU Press; 1 edition (November 1, 2009)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0814776396
- ISBN-13: 978-0814776391
- Product Dimensions: 0.9 x 6 x 9 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
On Speed: The Many Lives of Amphetamine PDF
This thoroughly researched and very well written book is the history of the amphetamine class of drugs that were first created in the early part of the 20th century and are still causing problems for society for today. In addition to the history of the drug, there is an allegorical story running parallel to the drug that is a detailed and scary look at practices in the pharmaceutical industry then and now.
Amphetamine, as a class of drugs, was first discovered by Gordon Alles in 1929 while he was doing research on adrenaline substitutes. Although he was not the first to actually identify the molecule, he was the first to precipitate the salt form and identify it as a potential drug. Eventually he sold the rights to the drug to the Smith Kline French Co. in Philadelphia and the hunt was on to find a use for the new drug, as it was a drug looking for a home.
The story follows the hunt to find a use for the new compound and the efforts by the company to get doctors to experiment with "creative" uses for the compound. The one thing the drug appeared to do well was to make people feel happy and empowered. Other than that, it had little use but the company worked around that problem by getting the military to issue speed to soldiers during World War II as a way of keeping them sharp.
The book follows these uses, as well as the use of the inhaler version for recreational drug use and deals, in detail, with the many times the drug could have been put out to pasture only to be rescued by the company that was making so much money from it.
It is still prescribed today, even given what is known about the addictive properties of the drug.
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