A vaccine designed to keep cocaine users from getting high is now in its first human trials at Yale University and may be commercially available within a decade. TA-CD, as the vaccine is known, does not reduce the craving for cocaine, said Dr. Thomas Kosten, a professor of psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine and principal investigator in the first human trials of a vaccine to thwart substance abuse. Since cravings are not reduced, the vaccine must be combined with behavioral therapy for abusers. But so far, the vaccine, a protein attached to a cocaine-like molecule, appears to be safe and to produce antibodies in the human bloodstream, Kosten said.
Researchers believe that the antibodies bind to cocaine in the bloodstream, making it inactive.
It is too soon to tell whether the vaccine will block or merely blunt the effect of cocaine, said Frank Vocci, director of the division of treatment research and development at the National Institute on Drug Abuse, which funded the Yale study and is part of the National Institutes of Health. Kosten's study was limited to evaluating the safety of the vaccine and the effect of varying doses on antibody production, Vocci said. Kosten's group is conducting a second study on dosage, while a third is planned to evaluate whether the vaccine blocks or blunts the effects of cocaine enough to be used for outpatient treatment. The Office of National Drug Control Policy estimates there are 3.6 million chronic cocaine users in the United States who use the drug at least once a week, Vocci said, or about 2 percent of the adult population. The Yale study was conducted at a residential treatment facility and followed 34 former cocaine abusers who were divided into three groups.