Anti-diarrhoea drug drives cancer cells to cell death
Several classes of opioids have been shown to cause neuronal degeneration via ATF4 activation. So, key points:<p>1. Loperamide is not unique. I don't know why these researchers have singled it out. Is it because they heard there's an opioid that doesn't get you high? It only avoids getting you high because it doesn't get into the brain. IF you deliver it to the brain to treat a brain tumor, it will get you high.<p>2. Patients with GBM already get a shit-ton of opioids for pain, which <i>do</i> cross the blood-brain barrier. Is there any reason at all to imagine that this opioid, using the same mechanism as other opioids, if delivered the area other opioids already reach, will have a different outcome?<p>3. I don't understand why identifying that loperamide causes cell death via ATF4 is even worth publishing. "Opioid that causes cell death uses same mechanism as other opioids that induce cell death"? Maybe I'm missing something here?<p>4. This was published in Autophagy. Which is another way of saying it wasn't novel enough to be published anywhere anyone reads. Which is why this is a university press release, and not a discussion by anyone else.