Pharmaceuticals and modern statecraft in South Africa: the cases of opium, thalidomide and contraception.

This article provides a history of three pharmaceuticals in the making of modern South Africa. Borrowing and adapting Arthur Daemmrich's term 'pharmacopolitics', we examine how forms of pharmaceutical governance became integral to the creation and institutional practices of this state. Through case studies of three medicaments: opium (late 19th to early 20th century), thalidomide (late 1950s to early 1960s) and contraception (1970s to 2010s), we explore the intertwining of pharmaceutical regulation, provision and consumption. Our focus is on the modernist imperative towards the rationalisation of pharmaceutical oversight, as an extension of the state's bureaucratic and ideological objectives, and, importantly, as its obligation. We also explore adaptive and illicit uses of medicines, both by purveyors of pharmaceuticals, and among consumers. The historical sweep of our study allows for an analysis of continuities and changes in pharmaceutical governance. The focus on South Africa highlights how the concept of pharmacopolitics can usefully be extended to transnational-as well as local-medical histories. Through the diversity of our sources, and the breadth of their chronology, we aim to historicise modern pharmaceutical practices in South Africa, from the late colonial era to the Post-Apartheid present.

[History of oyster as drug from the origin to the 21st century]. / Histoire de l'utilisation de l'huître comme médicament des origines au XXIe siècle.

Since Antiquity, oyster is a subject of interest and medical use, as indicated by Oribiase and Galien. From the 17th century, this unique drug was proposed by physicians for various diseases, and more often for (la rage). One could think that that drug disappeared at the 20th and 21st centuries. But we can observe that it was still recommended by several authors as drug. Still today, companies offer oyster under various forms for allopathic and homeopathic treatments, as well as for food supplement. Research are ongoing to discover active substances within oyster and their potential medical interests.

Hahnemann and placebo.

Samuel Hahnemann (1755-1843) known today as the founder of homoeopathy, was - as far as we know - the first physician who administrated placebos to his patient on a systematic and regular basis. This study is based upon unpublished documents (e.g. patients' letters) in the Archives of the Institute for the History of Medicine of the Robert Bosch Foundation in Stuttgart. It also profited from the critical edition of Hahnemann's case journals and the editorial comments which have also been published in this series. Hahnemann differentiated clearly between homeopathic drugs and pharmaceutical substances which he considered as sham medicine (e.g. milk sugar). A close look at Hahnemann's case journals reveals that the percentage of placebo prescriptions was very high (between 54 and 85 percent). In most instances Hahnemann marked placebos with the paragraph symbol (§). The rationale behind this practice was that Hahnemann had encountered the well-known problem that patients were used to taking medicine on a daily basis as it was typical for the age of heroic medicine. The main reason for giving placebo was therefore to please the impatient patient who was used to frequent medications in allopathic medicine, not only every day but sometimes also hourly.

[Evidential research on the first formulas for preparing qiushi (autumn mineral)].

Qiushi is a kind of elixir or medicine. This article examines the books which recorded the formulas for preparing Qiushi. It is found that Liang Fang (Valuable Prescriptions) written by Shen Kuo and Zheng Lei Ben Cao (recognized pharmacopoeia) written by Tang Shengwei recorded the first three formulas. Shen kuo, who recorded two kinds of methods to prepare Qiushi, was neglected by other medical books. The aim of the method to prepare Renzhongbai (natural sediment of urine) was actually to prepare Qiushi.

[The opinion of Herman Boerhaave on medicines, through a non-authorized book]. / Les conceptions d'Herman Boerhaave sur les médicaments, à travers un ouvrage non autorisé: le Traité de la Vertu des Medicamens.

The treatise of the Virtue of medicines - Herman Boerhaave (1668-1738) was a well known physician from Leiden, who was essentially known in France for the syndrome that received his name and for three of his books, which had been translated in French, and had much success during the 18th century, Elements of Chemistry, Aphorisms and Materia Medica. There was also a fourth book, The Treatise of the Virtue of Medicines, redacted by his students from notes taken during his lessons, which was translated in French in 1729. This volume, in in-8e format, of 471 pages, did not have the same success as his other books. It is anyway very interesting, because it shows that Boerhaave, even if he were Professor of Chemistry was not at all an iatrochemist but behaved as an iatromechanic.

200 years Organon of Medicine - A comparative review of its six editions (1810-1842).

In 2010 the 200th anniversary of the Organon is celebrated by the homeopathic community. Samuel Hahnemann's Organon of Rational Therapeutics, published in 1810, however, marks neither the beginning of homeopathy nor the endpoint of its development. On the one hand, its contents are based on terms and concepts developed and published by Hahnemann during the preceding two decades. On the other hand, the five revised editions of the Organon that followed in the next three decades contain major changes of theory and conceptions. Hahnemann's basic idea, running through all the stages of the foundation, elaboration, and defence of his doctrine, may be detected by a comparative review of his works from a historical and philosophical perspective.

The persistence of the subjective in neuropsychopharmacology: observations of contemporary hallucinogen research.

The elimination of subjectivity through brain research and the replacement of so-called "folk psychology" by a neuroscientifically enlightened worldview and self-conception has been both hoped for and feared. But this cultural revolution is still pending. Based on nine months of fieldwork on the revival of hallucinogen research since the "Decade of the Brain," this paper examines how subjective experience appears as epistemic object and practical problem in a psychopharmacological laboratory. In the quest for neural correlates of (drug-induced altered states of) consciousness, introspective accounts of test subjects play a crucial role in neuroimaging studies. Firsthand knowledge of the drugs' flamboyant effects provides researchers with a personal knowledge not communicated in scientific publications, but key to the conduct of their experiments. In many cases, the "psychedelic experience" draws scientists into the field and continues to inspire their self-image and way of life. By exploring these domains the paper points to a persistence of the subjective in contemporary neuropsychopharmacology.

"Its baneful influences are too well known": debates over drug use in Canada, 1867-1908.

This article examines the debates about drug addiction, as presented by medical and non-medical reformers in Victorian Canada, to explain the emergence of anti-narcotic legislation in the early twentieth century. Most of the studies of drug prohibition in Canada emphasize the anti-Chinese issues surrounding the drafting of the 1908 Opium Act. This study asserts that in order to understand why parliament unanimously accepted this legislation, we must look beyond the issue of anti-Chinese sentiment. It explores the discussions of drug addiction rhetoric. It concludes that the concern over both addiction in Canada and the Chinese in Canada drew upon parallel issues of freedom versus slavery, racial purity, and the need to protect the integrity of a moral and strong nation.

Hahnemann's experiments with 50 millesimal potencies: a further review of his casebooks.

BACKGROUND: A review of Hahnemann's clinical records at the Institute for History of Medicine of the Robert Bosch Foundation in Stuttgart shows that until the end of his life, Hahnemann continued to refine his clinical method, based on clinical cases. His "most perfected method" motivated him to write the sixth edition of the The Organon of the Healing Art, proposing solutions controlling the side effects he observed with repeated doses of homeopathic medicines. Unfortunately, this was published many years posthumously. The sixth edition of The Organon introduced the fifty-millesimal scale. OBJECTIVES: To identify the clinical cases treated with fifty-millesimal potencies and analyze Hahnemann's use of them. RESULTS: 1836 prescriptions of fifty-millesimal potencies were found, between 1837 and 1843 in three phases: initially sporadic; later compared regularly to centesimal dynamizations; and finally systematically. Thirty five medicines were identified in fifty-millesimal prescriptions, seven in potencies higher than 10 and only 3 (Sulphur, Mercurius solubilis and Rhus toxicodendron) used in the 30th degree. This accords with Haehl's information about the remedies in Hahnemann's case of fifty-millesimal potencies. CONCLUSIONS: Hahnemann probably decided to write the sixth edition, in 1840, to incorporate his latest experience with the repetition of potentized doses and periodically modified potencies. He must have revised it after February 1842 to include his latest findings with fifty-millesimal potencies in ascending degrees. Hahnemann's conception about the superiority of the fifty-millesimal in comparison with the centesimal dynamization was based on a significant number of experiments with the two scales.

[Explanation for "Jin Shuo Yin Kai" in Ben cao gang mu shi yi (Supplements to compendium of materia medica)].

The entry of "Jin Shuo Yin Kai" included in volume 7 of Ben Cao Gang Mu Shi Yi refers to Adiantum flabellulatum L. Fagopyrum cymesum Meisn, and polygenum penfoliatum L. respectively.

[The First School of Vienna and Samuel Hahnemann's pharmaceutical techniques]. / Der Einflub der Ersten Wiener Schule auf das Arzneiverständnis bei Samuel Hahnemann.

The First or Elder Vienna School of Medicine was initiated by Gerard van Swieten, the famous pupil of Herman Boerhaave. The aim of this school was to put medicine on new scientific foundations-promoting unprejudiced clinical observation, botanical and chemical research, and the introduction of simple but powerful remedies. One of the products of this school was Anton Störck (1731-1803), appointed Director of Austrian public health and medical education by Empress Maria Theresia. Following the tradition of the Vienna School, Störck was the first scientist to systematically test the effects of so-called poisonous plants (e.g., hemlock, henbane, meadow saffron). Discovering new therapeutic properties in previously dreaded plants, Störck used himself as a subject in experiments to determine tolerable dose levels. As a result of his investigations, Störck was able to successfully treat his patients using the drugs he discovered. Samuel Hahnemann's later writings, including his "Organon", show that he was considerably influenced by Störck's ideas. In fact, Hahnemann's clinical teacher at Vienna was a follower of Störck, Joseph Quarin. Hahnemann's elaborate system of validating homeopath material can be seen as a development and refinement of the techniques he learned in Vienna.

[Pharmaceutical industry and "New German Medicine" ("Neue Deutsche Heilkunde")]. / Pharmazeutische Industrie und "Neue Deutsche Heilkunde".

THe so-called "New German Medicine", initially propagated in the health policy of the National Socialist Party, promoted greater use of phytotherapeutic and homeopathic drugs by the medical community. In response, the "Reichsfachschaft der pharmazeutischen Industrie e. V." (Association of Pharmaceutical Industry of the Reich") was obliged to pursue a carefully chosen double strategy, given that the members of the Association were both manufacturers of natural remedies and manufacturers of allopathic drugs.However, the fact that I.G. Farben completely ignored the "New German Medicine" suggests that the large chemical-pharmaceutical manufacturers did not take this policy very seriously. The only documents pertaining to increased research in the area of natural remedies stem from the medium-sized manufacturers Knoll and Schering. In the case of both companies it is noteworthy that they worked towards obtaining a scientific foundation for the developed preparates, and that they employed conventional methods of chemical analysis and proof of activity. THe growth of the classical manufacturers of natural remedies, such as the company Willmar Schwabe was, as far as any growth at all could be observed, significantly smaller than had been theoretically postulated. There is no casual relationship between any commercial success during the period in which the Nazis were in power and today's commercial prosperity.Moreover, from the viewpoint of the pharmaceutical industry, the "New German Medicine" seems to have passed its zenith before 1936, when the 4-year plan for war preparation entered into force.