Place for Aboriginal medicine

Press, 21 June 1980, Page 16

Place for Aboriginal medicine

By

Australian Information Service

JOHN HANAFIN,

An Australian pharmacologist, Professor Graham Johnston, of the University of Sydney, believes that Aboriginal medicine could help to unlock some of the secrets of the human brain.

Professor Johnston, aged 40, has already achieved distinction in this field as the discoverer in 1970 of the effects of the alkaloid, bicuculline, on the brain. There are now more than 1000 papers published on this subject It was his interest in folk medicine that helped pave the way for Professor Johnston’s work on bicuculline. He and a research team working on a neurotransmitter in the brain called gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) noticed the similarity of its chemical structure to a substance called muscimol, which occurs in folklore medi-

cine’s “magic mushroom,” known as Soma.

“These mushrooms are red with white spots and you see them everywhere in folk literature, especially in children’s books such as Alice in Wonderland,” Professor Johnston said.

Soma is probably the world’s oldest drug. It has been traced to pre-historic times, but the secrets of

its mind-bending qualities were confined chiefly to tribal elders who used it to achieve power and influence. “Soma is still found today in forests in cold climates and, when we noticed the resemblance of its active agent, muscimol, with GABA, our research led to the development of

new drugs which are undergoing clinical trials for a number of diseases, including schizophrenia,” said Professor Johnston. . A mixture of chance and chemical trials led to the discovery of bicucuk line — a stimulant working in an opposite way to the sedatory GABA and muscimol.

In 1977, the discovery

was made of natural GABA inhibitors, substances with anti-anxiety and sedative properties which inhibit the action of GABA in the brain. "One drug which displaces a GABA inhibitor is valium," Professor Johnston said. “Normally GABA is inhibited in its action by a small protein.

"Valium displaces this small protein and in this way makes GABA even more effective in its role as an inhibiting transmitter. The net result is a slowing down of the nervous system by tuning up this inhibitory mechanism.”

Professor Johnston said that betel nut, probably the world’s most popular drug next to alcohol, could be described as the Asian equivalent of valium because it worked in the same way but by a different mechanism.

This is why he wants to make a study of Aboriginal medicine one of his department’s new research projects. He is convinced that a step-by-step analysis of the effect of drugs — modem drugs like valium and librium or ancient ones from sources like the magic mushroom and the betel nut — is

one of the most effective ways of finding out how the human brain works. “I suspect that the preEuropean Aboriginals had a good system of medicine,” said Professor Johnson.

"There’s a strong belief, for example, that the Aboriginals knew about oral contraceptives long before modem science.

“Another possibility is that their society was such that they did not have to use drugs to supplement those already in the brain. Modem neuroscience has already determined the brain has its own equivalent of drugs like morphine, valium and the Soma agent, muscimol. "Also, we can’t discount the power of the Aboriginal witchdoctor. Pointing the bone, as they did to convince a person he was going to die. was use of mental power.