The Baltimore Sun has an interesting science piece indicating that sham painkillers actually work -- a finding that lends itself to many analogies, starting with television news and politics. But another suggests itself, too. The Wall Street Journal reports that the really cool science that could save lives often doesn't get funded because the less immediately important, but more conventional, research squeezes what dwindling federal money there is. Unfortunately, the WSJ is subscription only but the whole thing usually shows up on a Google site pretty soon.
Researchers in Baltimore have discovered a biological basis for the work of a placebo -- the sugar pill or sham procedure used in head-to-head trials of drugs to keep participants from knowing whether they are getting real or fake treatment. Over the years, investigators have noticed placebos actually can have a real effect on symptoms.
The latest research finds that subjects injected with a saline solution, instead of morphine, can experience pain relief similar to the dosage of the real drug. The hope here is to better understand the placebo effect to harness the body's ability to reduce pain naturally, reports the Baltimore Sun.
Not too far away in Washington, another placebo effect is being observed. This one is not biological at all, but the product of conventional wisdom.
Federal funding for research is so diminished that the scientists who judge which proposals are worthy of support usually take the safe, conservative, non-risky approach and fund what they have always funded, the Wall Street Journal reports. In other words, they administer funding placebos -- research that makes you think more knowledge is being produced than is evident while real breakthroughs may blush unseen.