Vaccine may treat cocaine addiction by blocking drug’s entry to brain

A small trial of an experimental vaccine designed to stop cocaine reaching the brain suggests that it helps reduce the drug’s use.

Over a 32-week trial involving monthly injections, the urine of seven people given the vaccine was 17 per cent more likely to test negative for cocaine compared with that of three people given a placebo injection, says Stephen Kaminsky at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City. “The participants in the trial were all considered severely addicted.”