Mar 8, 2011

The Fear in Me?

Can fear change you for the better? Gregory Warner from Marketplace takes us to a clinic in Russia that aims to scare patients sober--with a pill called "the torpedo." Vyacheslav Davidov, the doctor who runs the clinic, describes the treatment and makes a case for the therapeutic powers of terror. Anna Masterova translates, and tells us about her late uncle--who turned to a very similar treatment to manage his own drinking. Cultural and medical anthropologist Eugene Raikhel helps explain the procedure, and why it isn't likely to catch on in the US. 

 

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