Opium Research Articles

Current Prevalence of Substance Use Disorders and Its Dynamics in the Republic of Crimea: A Retrospective Study

Introduction: The study of the prevalence of narcological disorders is an integral part of the monitoring of the drug situation allowing identification of the main trends in the situation with the use of narcotic drugs. Objective: To analyze the level and structure of non-medical use of prescription drugs among the population of the Republic of Crimea and to assess their dynamics in 2020–2021. Materials and methods: The subject of the study was quantitative indicators characterizing the spread of drug use disorders in the Republic of Crimea. The information base of the study included data and materials of the Federal State Statistics Service and the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Crimea. We processed data of the statistical reporting documentation for 2020–2021, Forms No. 37, Information on patients with alcoholism, drug addiction, substance abuse, and No. 11, Incidence of substance use disorders. Incidence and prevalence rates were estimated per 100 thousand population. The data were analyzed in Microsoft Excel. Results: We established an increase in the incidence of substance use disorders in the Republic of Crimea in 2020–2021 from 38.3 to 42.9 per 100 thousand population (by 12.01 % in the year 2021 compared to 2020) and an increase in the overall incidence of drug addiction and abuse from 566.5 to 578.3 per 100 thousand population (2.08 %). We noted a slight decrease in opium addiction, transition to new synthetic drugs, and an increase in the proportion of a combined use of narcotic drugs. Males aged 20 to 59 years predominate among drug users. Conclusions: Our findings show a consistently high prevalence of non-medical use of prescription drugs among the population in the Republic of Crimea, an increase in the incidence and prevalence of drug addiction and in the number of doctor’s visits among drug abusers, and a growth of drug overdose deaths.

Review: Trading Freedom: How Trade with China Defined Early America, by Dael A. Norwood

Dael Norwood offers an engaging account of how Sino-American intercourse shaped the political economy of the United States in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Norwood situates the China Trade—by the late 1870s, the “China Market” (p. 157)—within a developing American national identity that trumpeted the United States’s centrality to systems of capitalism and global commerce. Through a series of vignettes highlighting crucial figures, legislation, and debates related to Sino-American trade, Norwood charts the rise and decline of U.S. commerce with the Qing Empire and its lasting impact on how Americans conceived of their nation’s place within the world economy.Trading Freedom is foremost a history of the United States, and therein lie its strengths. Norwood brings a metropolitan perspective to debates that have captured the attention of China trade historians for years. Discussions linking the opium trade to American ideas of sovereignty (pp. 78–92), or debates connecting the trade in indentured Chinese labor to immigration law (pp. 130–32), masterfully interweave the complex agendas of the government, domestic lobbyists, and China merchants. Especially interesting in this regard is Norwood’s account of Asa Whitney’s campaign for a transcontinental railroad—a movement that used the prospect of Pacific trade with China to drive America’s global commercial ascendency (p. 111) while, ironically, directing much-needed capital away from a flagging China trade (p. 163). In these examples, and indeed throughout the book, Norwood makes a compelling case for China’s importance to the realization U.S. imperial ambitions.The book is particularly effective in its discussion of Sino-American trade’s late nineteenth-century decline—a topic that has received only a light touch to date. Norwood ties this decline to the evolving industrial landscape of a maturing economy that saw the U.S. shift gears from an agricultural producer to a manufacturing giant intent to vent “surplus goods to overseas markets” (p. 176). The convincing argument contextualizes and expands greatly upon that advanced in Thomas McCormick’s China Market, providing a necessary answer to why old American China firms practicing outdated models of commission, brokerage, and shipping failed so spectacularly in the 1870s and 1880s.Still, while the book is an American history, it would have been illustrative to see more nuanced accounts of the relationship between American private enterprise and politics in China. The filibusters hinted at (Frederick Townsend Ward comes to mind) were rather more of an issue to Sino-American relations than the discussion of Anson Burlingame’s diplomatic struggles suggests (p. 141). The Confederate raider Alabama never sailed further north than Borneo but did wreak havoc on American trading and Anglo-American politics (p. 141). The Taiping Civil War (p. 139)—quickly recognized as a disaster for commerce—proved integral to Sino-American and Anglo-American debates about neutrality and sovereignty both in China and at home.Such points should not, however, detract from the impressive deft with which Norwood weaves together complex political and commercial developments unfolding in the United States and China. The book is well researched, crisply written, and, importantly, addresses a long-overlooked aspect of Sino-American contact. Trading Freedom is certain to become a vital reference point for scholars interested in the political economy of the United States, new histories of capitalism, and U.S. imperial ambitions.

Effect of Social Beliefs on Consumption of Dairy Products and Its Predicting Factors Based on the Transtheoretical Model: A Population-Based Study.

Social beliefs on the consumption of dairy products are associated with health conditions, and the aim of this study is to investigate associated factors with the rate of dairy product intake, in accordance with social health-related beliefs and the elements predicting dairy consumption, based on the transtheoretical Model (TTM). 981 subjects (chosen from Mashhad citizens, Iran) were surveyed in random public places in 2014, using demographic surveys and questionnaires based on TTM and advantage/disadvantage by trained interviewers. 981 Subjects with a mean age of 30.39 ± 14.83 were surveyed in dairy nonconsumer and dairy consumer groups. There was a significant relationship between dairy consumption and gender (P < 0.001). Factors such as age, educational level, job status, and opium addiction were found to be significantly associated with dairy consumption status. Young and female subjects consume more dairy products than their older and male counterparts, respectively. People with a diploma degree and lower levels of education consumed substantially more dairy products than their educated equals. Unemployed participants consumed considerably more dairy products than their fellow employed participants. Opium-addicted subjects were more likely to avoid dairy products. Despite the general belief of dairy consumption being beneficial, subjects in the precontemplation stage as nonconsumers described dairy products as of poor taste having low diversity in markets. Also, among the reasons, dairies' short shelf-life and behaviours under the influence of society and family were the mains. The termination stage's subjects as consumers consumed dairy products mostly for losing weight.

Opium may affect coronary artery disease by inducing inflammation but not through the expression of CD9, CD36, and CD68.

The molecular mechanisms of opium action with regard to coronary artery disease (CAD) have not yet been determined. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of opium on the expression of scavenger receptors including CD36, CD68, and CD9 tetraspanin in monocytes and the plasma levels of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), interferon gamma (IFN-γ), malondialdehyde (MDA), and nitric oxide metabolites (NOx) in CAD patients with and without opium addiction. This case-control study was conducted on three groups: (1) opium-addicted CAD patients (CAD + OA, n = 30); (2) CAD patients with no opium addiction (CAD, n = 30); and (3) individuals without CAD and opium addiction as the control group (Ctrl, n = 17). The protein and mRNA levels of CD9, CD36, and CD68 were evaluated by the flow cytometry and quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) methods, respectively. The consumption of atorvastatin, aspirin, and glyceryl trinitrate was found be higher in the CAD groups compared with the control group. The plasma level of TNF-α was significantly higher in the CAD + OA group than in the CAD and Ctrl groups (p = 0.001 and p = 0.005, respectively). MDA levels significantly increased in CAD and CAD + OA patients in comparison with the Ctrl group (p = 0.010 and p = 0.002, respectively). No significant differences were found in CD9, CD36, CD68, IFN-γ, and NOx between the three groups. The findings demonstrated that opium did not have a significant effect on the expression of CD36, CD68, and CD9 at gene and protein levels, but it might be involved in the development of CAD by inducing inflammation through other mechanisms.

The Collapse of Mercantilism: Anglo-Hispanic Trans-Pacific Ventures in Asia at the End of the Spanish Empire (1815–30)

Early modern connections between the Pacific shores of the Spanish Empire have been assessed in previous studies and yet, studies on the subsequent developments during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries are scant. This particularly applies to the consequences of the commercial developments at the end of the Manila Galleon and the collapse of the Spanish Empire in America. Through the analysis of the professional networks of Francisco Xavier de Ezpeleta, and Juan Nepomuceno Machado, which stretched from Asia to Mexico at the time, this paper proposes some preliminary conclusions about trans-Pacific links. It focuses on the study of networks and connections, and builds upon archival sources — mostly from the Jardine Matheson Archive, in Cambridge. In the transition from the eighteenth to the nineteenth centuries, actors who made up Hispanic trading networks in what remained of the crumbling Spanish Empire, reorganised to benefit from opportunities as mercantilist limitations came to an end. In so doing, by the 1820s, Hispanic traders allied with the forebears of the British firm of Jardine, Matheson &amp; Co., and controlled the resulting networks. This paper points to Hispanic trans-Pacific connections during the development of European private trade between East Asia and the Mexican Pacific. Ties between British and Hispanic merchants are key for the analysis of the opium trade and Western imperialism in East Asia, and the development of British commercial hegemony in Latin America in the nineteenth century.

Camilo Pessanha’s Missing City: Race, Poetry, and Urban Writing in Portuguese Macau

The Portuguese poet Camilo Pessanha’s long stint in Macau has been the subject of much scholarly debate and biographical intrigue. Critics have tended either to deny the city’s poetic import altogether, erroneously claiming that Pessanha wrote virtually no poetry in Macau, or else present a highly romanticized portrait of the poet’s time there, focusing on his opium addiction and emphasizing the city’s exoticism. In this article I seek to problematise both portrayals, examining Pessanha’s poetry in light of his critical writings on Macau. My analysis shows that Macau’s heady cultural life interacted powerfully with Pessanha’s individualized notions of pastoral poetics and theory of race.

Investigation of Methylation Levels in COMT Gene Promoter among Smokers and Opium Addicted Individuals Undergoing Methadone Treatment

1.1. Background: Previous studies have demonstrated that the COMT gene is associated with alcohol, nicotine, and illicit substances. The aim of the present study was to examine the methylation status of a remarkable region in the COMT gene promoter in methadone-treated smokers and addicts. Methods: All male samples, including 30 smokers, 30 opium addicts receiving methadone treatment, and 30 healthy individuals, had their DNAs extracted from their whole blood and processed with a sodium bisulfite kit. 61 CpG dinucleotides were included in the study region and were sequenced.

Mapping Global Literary Decadence: Jeet Thayil's The Book of Chocolate Saints

Mapping Global Literary DecadenceJeet Thayil's The Book of Chocolate Saints Robert Stilling (bio) In Oscar Wilde's 1891 novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, Lady Henry persuades Dorian to attend her parties by telling him: "You must come. I can't afford orchids, but I spare no expense in foreigners. They make one's room look so picturesque."1 The moment illustrates how in late-Victorian decadent literature, the "foreign" is so often appreciated to the extent that it is rare, commodified, decorative, and domesticated. Foreigners, arranged like flowers, do not create beauty so much as they add to an overall aesthetic impression. And yet, Wilde's novel, being written by an Irishman in London, also illustrates the open-ended possibilities for cross-cultural identification that decadent literature makes possible.2 Upon reading the "poisonous" book given to him by Lord Henry and seeing himself in its protagonist, Dorian realizes that "one had ancestors in literature, as well as in one's own race." With this realization, the "whole of recorded history" becomes available to Dorian as if it were "the record of his own life." That history, however, proves to be a tale of vice, extravagance, and tyranny. The figures Dorian identifies with are Roman emperors Tiberius, Caligula, Domitian, Nero, and Elagabalus, "those strange terrible figures that had passed across the stage of the world and made sin so marvellous and evil so full of subtlety."3 Fin-de-siècle decadent literature is made of such tensions between cosmopolitan xenophilia and exoticism, between aesthetic genealogies that lie beyond the confines of race and nation, and extravagances underpinned by imperial brutality. It is precisely because of these tensions [End Page 145] that decadent literary strategies remain vital for contemporary postcolonial and diasporic writers. By engaging with a literary movement that seems hopelessly entangled with exoticism and orientalism, writers and artists such as Jeet Thayil, Shola Von Reinhold, Yinka Shonibare, Hanif Kureishi, Anita Desai, Bernardine Evaristo, and others, turn such tropes on their head, extending the cultural relevance of fin-de-siècle literature into the twenty-first century.4 If Lady Henry spares no "expense" in foreigners, contemporary writers presume a world literary market in which, as Sarah Brouillette notes, "particularity and difference" have themselves become commodities.5 These writers therefore redeploy decadent literary strategies to satirize the systems of consecration by which literary value is established. Contemporary decadent writing offers a vision of the literary field based not on the classics of "world literature," an idea that, as Aamir Mufti has argued, arose in conjunction with the project of orientalism, but one based on counter-canons of marginalized and peripheral artists who nevertheless stake a claim to global visibility and recognition.6 In tracing the ongoing entanglement of dominant cultural institutions with the legacies of colonialism, contemporary decadent writing demonstrates how literature of the previous fin de siècle has gained resonance among those who whom Lady Henry might have invited to the party, but not included in the conversation, scrambling the origins and trajectories of decadent literature in the process. To illustrate this point, I turn to Jeet Thayil's 2018 novel The Book of Chocolate Saints, which tells the story of Newton Xavier, a painter, poet, and aging enfant terrible of the Bombay art scene.7 Xavier is known for painting dark-skinned portraits of Christian saints who have been whitewashed in the blond, blue-eyed annals of art history. The novel thus satirizes how acts of canonization, be it religious, literary, or artistic, bestow whiteness and erase color. Thayil's related novels Narcopolis (2012) and Low (2020) further highlight the entanglement of elite cultural institutions with the wealth accumulated through the opium trade in India and China.8 Given the pervasive orientalism of fin-de-siècle literature, for an Indian writer to engage with decadence is to risk self-exoticization and "re-Orientalization" by appealing to Western stereotypes of addiction [End Page 146] and destitution.9 But to embrace decadence is also to reveal how the deliriously dystopian forms of "post-millennial" Indian writing in English are rooted in an earlier fin de siècle apocalypticism, just as the "social damages" wrought...

Clinical Practice Guidelines for Assessment and Management of Patients with Substance Intoxication Presenting to the Emergency Department.

Clinical Practice Guidelines for Assessment and Management of Patients with Substance Intoxication Presenting to the Emergency Department.

China, the Awakened Giant

The history of Chinese medicine is as long and legendary as that of the country itself. Its origins date back 3000 years [1]. Scientific knowledge and medical practice has gone through numerous stages. Between the 8th and 3rd centuries BC, China went through a period of great cultural and intellectual development called the “Hundred Schools of Thought” [2]. An attempt was made to seek the explanation of the phenomena of the universe in nature itself, leaving aside explanations based on magic and myths [2]. The new ideas discussed and developed during this period have profoundly influenced philosophical views and lifestyles up to the present day in East Asian countries. A fundamental milestone was the publication of “Huangdi Neijing“. Also known as the “Inner Canon of Huangdi“ or “Inner Canon of the Yellow Emperor“, it is the earliest surviving work on Chinese medicine[3]. Its author, Emperor Huangdi, is not only considered the initiator of Chinese Traditional Medicine but also the father of Chinese civilization. Caring for the health of the population has been a priority in this country throughout the centuries. As a history lover, it is difficult for me to find another example of a nation embarking on an unequal war to defend its public health. This happened when the Western powers, led by the British Empire, sought to create opium addiction among the Chinese population in order to balance their trade balance by trafficking drugs [4]. These infamous conflicts went down in history as the “Opium Wars” and cost the lives of thousands of Chinese citizens. In the last decades, China’s healthcare system has made great achievements in the management of medical services and public health for the Chinese people[5]. Average life expectancy at birth was 35 years before the founding of new China, and it reached 77.0 years in 2018 [6]. The projected life expectancy at birth in mainland China in 2035 is 81,3 years [7]. On April 6, 2009, China presented an action plan to undertake a radical and ambitious reform of the health system [8]. The goal is to achieve universal health coverage. The history of shock waves in this country is a reflection of the described dynamism and historical background. The beginnings of its use in China can be traced back to the 1980s in the urological field. Prof. Xing Gengyan was the pioneer of indications in musculoskeletal pathology starting in 1993. Since that moment he has been a promoter not only of research and clinical applications, but also of medical education. In 2019, he organized in Beijing the largest international shock wave congress in history. It is a great honor that he has contributed to this issue by writing about the development of this therapeutic practice in China. In parallel with healthcare and academic development, the Chinese industry has risen to the occasion by providing high-quality devices. The content of this volume reflects not only the ability of our Chinese colleagues but also their openness to the world and their generosity in sharing information. Numerous universities and hospitals from different regions throughout China have collaborated selflessly. This could not have been accomplished without the monumental task of Dr. Sun Wei, our Guest Editor. Napoleon Bonaparte is credited with the phrase “China is a sleeping giant, when she wakes she will shake the world“. Two hundred years later the giant is awake and brimming with energy.

Displacement in Sea of Poppies

In Sea of Poppies, Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh presents the nineteenth-century British imperialist activities including the cultivation of opium as a cash crop in India for the Chinese market, the transportation of the Asiatic to work on sugar plantations in Mauritius Island, the introduction of the free trade, and the approach of opium wars. This paper will look how the environmental injustice created social injustice. British imperialists’ intensification of the production of the poppy planton the bank of the River Ganga to maintain the opium trade between India and China transformed local people first to peasant labour and then to the indentured workers. Ghoshre imagines their loss of local place and dispersion in global place as the indentured labour. He plots the afterlife of a former slave ship, the Ibıs, which was in the service of the East Indian Company to carry the indentured labour. This paper sets out to discuss how its traumatic movement to sugar plantations characterized diaspora; the ship became shared past, home, parent for the diverse characters. The emphasis will be put on Ghosh’s construction of identity in relation to the place from postcolonial eco critical perspective. In his engagement with the connection of place and people, both place and displacement are the essential parts of identity construction. Both places and identities are related and changed through the experience of displacement, mobility. The characters went beyond developing personal identification, fixity, and attachment to a local place within a national border, they were situated in a world of mobility and flexibility which promoted cultural and self-development.

A Comparison of Blood Indices in Orally and Inhaled Opium Addicts with Non-addict Healthy Control

Background: Drug abuse and drug dependence are very common in the community, which causes complications in patients. It is necessary to identify these complications. Objectives: The aim of this study was to compare the blood parameters of oral and inhaled opium addicts with healthy individuals in Zahedan. Methods: This study was performed on 60 people (20 in the group of oral opium addicts, 20 in the group of inhaled opium addicts, and 20 in the healthy group). After recording demographic information, blood parameters were recorded and analyzed. Results: The findings of our study showed that the mean of white blood cell (WBC), platelets (PLT), mean corpuscular volume (MCV), mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH), and mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC) was not significantly different in the three groups. However, it was found that the mean of red blood cell (RBC), hemoglobin (Hb), and hematocrit (Hct) in the healthy groups and serum lead (Pb) levels in addicts was significantly higher, but no difference was seen between the oral and inhaled groups. It was also found that in all subjects, Pb had an inverse and significant relationship with RBC, Hb, and Hct. Conclusions: The higher levels of Pb in the blood of substance abusers may cause further anemia, and blood Pb levels must be frequently checked in substance abusers.

Helicobacter pylori Standard Triple Therapy Outcomes in Iranian Population: A Retrospective Population-based Study in Mashhad, Northeast of Iran

Background: Helicobacter pylori infection is one of the most prevalent infections in many areas of the world, which is treated with different combinations of medications. Objectives: This study aimed to investigate the response rate and outcomes of H. pylori-infected Iranian patients treated with triple therapy. Methods: The current study examined the records of patients with dyspepsia referred to Imam Reza hospital's gastroenterology clinic in Mashhad, Iran, diagnosed with H. pylori from 2017 to 2019. The patients received the triple therapy for H. pylori and were divided into responsive and non-responsive groups. Results: Out of the 750 patients, 477 were included in the study. The response rate to H. pylori standard triple therapy was 79% after 14 days of treatment. Patients aged 30 - 39 years had the highest rate of treatment response. There was no significant relationship between the response rate to treatment and smoking (P = 0.74), alcohol consumption (P = 0.91), opium addiction (P = 0.89), history of aspirin (P = 0.46) or nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) use (P = 0.66), diabetes (P = 0.18), renal failure (P = 0.054), and family history of GI malignancies (P = 0.51). Furthermore, patients with gastric ulcer (P = 0.43), duodenal ulcer (P = 0.66), and gastric precancerous lesions (P = 0.93) showed no significant difference in response to treatment. Conclusions: The H. pylori triple therapy regimen can be an effective medication strategy for H. pylori infection in the Iranian population.

A History of Opium Commodity Chains in Mexico, 1900–1950

Classic treatments of both the opium industry and the international drug trade tend to leave out Mexico’s opium production. Yet the industry, which emerged in the 1920s, both fulfilled U.S. demands and shaped the Mexican narcotics trade.

Китай глазами русских мореплавателей: забытые записки В. А. Римского-Корсакова

The aim of the study is to present the thematic originality and determine the genre of V. A. Rimsky-Korsakov’s notes about China, the Chinese and foreign nationals who were in China in the middle of the XIX century. The study is novel in that it is the first to consider the notes of the commander of the schooner “Vostok” not only as a historical source, but also as literary texts. The navigator’s notes about China are a part of his epistolary heritage. Residents of Canton, Shanghai and Hong Kong caught the observer’s eye. Ethnographically accurate descriptions offer insight into the ethno-cultural heterogeneity of the Chinese population. The accuracy and objectivity of the assessments that V. A. Rimsky-Korsakov gives to the political situation in the world testify to his outstanding statesmanlike judgement. The author harshly criticised the opium trade, which served as a means of enriching the commercial and industrial circles of Great Britain and the United States. The images created by the author are memorable due to the raciness of the characteristics and the attention to detail. As a result, the study has shown that the epistolary heritage of V. A. Rimsky-Korsakov can be defined as maritime documentary fiction - a kind of travel genre of literature.

Defensa comunitaria y culturas del terror: Crimen organizado y violencia de Estado en comunidades originarias de Guerrero, México

AbstractRich in raw materials, the state of Guerrero, Mexico, is one of the main enclaves of opium production, mineral extraction, and a focus for the multiplication of armed actors in Latin America, which, together with the overlapping of counterinsurgent violence in the past, post‐colonial violence and the militarization of the policies of the so‐called fight against drugs has contributed to very high rates of multiple and continuous violence. Drawing on investigative ethnographic fieldwork, testimonial work and a hemerographic review in Guerrero, this article investigates how the entanglement between state, para‐state, criminal and community actors leads to some short of “state of exception,” as well as to the emergence of forms of territorial organization. Through a case study in rural Nahua communities of Chilapa and echoing studies on the anthropology of violence, state anthropology and anarchist anthropology, we discuss the culture of terror at the margins of the state and the strategies of community and everyday resistance, that, although seek to ensure their political and economic survival, are at risk of being captured by some forms of the violence they fight.

Empire, Bureaucracy, and the Opium Trade in Southeast Asia

Empire, Bureaucracy, and the Opium Trade in Southeast Asia

Evaluation of blood lead levels in opium addicts and healthy control group using novel deep eutectic solvent based dispersive liquid-liquid microextraction followed by GFAAS.

Today, drug dealers and sellers add lead compounds to these substances to get more profit. As a result, drug users are heavily exposed to lead, and lead poisoning is clearly seen in most of them. Therefore, it is especially important to check the blood lead levels in these people. In this research, an efficient and eco-friendly pretreatment method was established by deep eutectic solvent for dispersive liquid-liquid microextraction (DES - DLLME) followed by graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry (GFAAS) analysis. The selected hydrophilic deep eutectic solvent consists of l-menthol and (1S)-( +)-camphor-10-sulfonic acid (CSA) at a 5:1 molar ratio as a green solvent instead of traditional toxic organic solvents. Under the optimal extraction conditions, the introduced method exhibited good linearity with coefficient of determination (r2) 0.9975 and an acceptable linear range of 0.3-80µg L-1. Accordingly, the detection limit was 0.1µg L-1 (S/N = 3) for lead ions, and the high enrichment factor (240) was obtained. The proposed method was successfully applied to analysis lead ions in real blood samples, which is a promising technique for biological samples. The case samples were classified and analyzed based on age, duration of consumption, and type of substance. The results showed that there was no significant difference between blood lead levels in different age groups and different duration of use, while blood lead levels were higher in opium residue (shireh) users than in opium users.

A Comparison between Russia-Qing Trade and Anglo-Chinese Trade in 1802–1860

During the first half of the nineteenth century, tea became an essential commodity in the Kyakhta trade, accounting for over 90 % of total imports. Russia increased tea imports to address its growing demand for tea. The country handled the increasing tea imports by simultaneously increasing the exports of fur, wool, and cotton. British trade with China in Guangzhou was for smuggled opium in exchange for tea. When the Qing dynasty attempted to eradicate opium trade, the UK waged two wars and legalised the opium trade. The UK’s illegal opium trade and military provocations had a significant impact on China’s politics, economy, and society, as well as a decisive impact on the decline of the Kyakhta trade. Opium, which was banned, became a monopoly product for the British, and Russia’s export products — except for silver — could not compete with opium. The UK’s illegal sale of opium increased China’s opium consumption. Consequently, this reduced the purchasing power of the Chinese, worsening the sales conditions of Russian export products. In the end, the opium trade led to a shortage of silver and an increase in the value of silver coins in China. Chinese merchants preferred silver or silver coins to other products when trading with Russia. As a result, the Russian government approved the exchange of silver, effectively ending barter trade throughout Kyakhta.

Interleukin-33 and Soluble ST2 as Potential Biomarkers of Cancer in Opium Users: A Nested Case-Control Study.

Opium abuse is one of the social hazards in the Middle Eastern countries. Opium consumption attributes to various malignancies. However, the exact molecular mechanism of this correlation still remains unclear. Cancer and inflammation are closely correlated. Interleukin-33 (IL-33) and its receptors, transmembrane ST2 (ST2L) and soluble ST2 (sST2), have been significantly associated with tumorigenicity. The present study aimed to investigate whether IL-33 and sST2 levels serve as cancer biomarkers in opium users. Serum samples were collected from 100 opium users and 100 healthy non-opium users in a nested case-control design. The subjects with over five years of history of opium abuse were enrolled. To assess the incidence of malignancies, the opium users were followed up from 2014 to 2019. Serum levels of IL-33 and sST2 were measured using an ELISA kit. For comparison of IL-33 and sST2 levels between the groups, two-tailed Student's t test and Mann-Whitney U test were utilized, accordingly. Logistic regression analysis was performed to evaluate the influence of confounders on the incidence of cancer. During the five-year follow-up, eight opium users were diagnosed with cancer. Cancer was developed by 9.3 folds in the individuals abusing opium compared to that in the non-opium users (P=0.040, OR=9.3; 95%CI [1.1-79.4]). Serum levels of IL-33 were found to be significantly higher in the opium users than those in the healthy control group (P=0.001). The sST2 levels were significantly lower in the opium users (P=0.001). The opium users with cancer exhibited significantly higher levels of IL-33 and lower levels of sST2 than the cancer-free ones (P=0.001). Decline in sST2 levels and rise in the level of IL-33 are valuable biomarkers in predicting cancers. Regarding the significant alterations in the levels of these biomarkers in the opium users, as well as those in the opium users diagnosed with cancer, IL-33 and sST2 may serve as potential biomarkers in the early prediction of cancer.