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Lethal injection table.
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Lethal Injection Is Not Based on Science

The history of the three-drug combo used in death-penalty executions. 
by Corinna Barrett Lain via HNN on April 29, 2025
Carrie Baker and her book Abortion Pills: US History and Politics.

The Forgotten—and Incredibly Important—History of the Abortion Pill

Mifepristone took longer to get approved than most drugs—but not because it was unsafe.
by Nina Martin via Mother Jones on February 7, 2025
Sign on fence reading "This is a D.A.R.E. drug free school zone."

D.A.R.E. Is More Than Just Antidrug Education—It Is Police Propaganda

DARE lost its once hegemonic influence over drug education, but it had long-lasting effects on American policing, politics, and culture.
by Max Felker-Kantor via Public Books on April 17, 2024
Packets of Mifepristone, the abortion pill.
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Judge Kacsmaryk’s Medication Abortion Decision Distorts a Key Precedent

One of the cases on which the judge relies said the opposite of what he claims it did.
by Donna J. Drucker via Made By History on March 29, 2024
Inventor of mifepristone Etienne-Emile Baulieu in lab

The Long and Winding History of the War on Abortion Drugs

While these pills are making headlines in the US, where a Texas judge tried to ban them, the story of their invention is often overlooked.
by Lara Bullens via France24 on April 26, 2023
Three men standing along a store sign outside of a drug store, listing the available drugs and tonics for treatment.

The Tragic Case of Poisoning That Finally Got Us Safe Drugs

The elixir had antifreeze, for flavor. Nobody blinked—at first.
by Mikkael A. Sekeres via Slate on October 1, 2022
A woman standing in a field.
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Drug Prohibition and the Political Roots of Cartel Violence in Mexico

Until both American and Mexican police forces stop treating it like a war, the violence of drug prohibition won't stop.
by Benjamin T. Smith via HNN on August 8, 2021
Ketamine bottles

The Many Lives of Ketamine

Neuroscientist Bita Moghaddam traces the history of ketamine from the battlefield to the dance floor.
by Sam Kelly, Bita Moghaddam via The MIT Press Reader on October 20, 2020

How ADHD Was Sold

A new book outlines an epidemic of over-diagnosis and addiction.
by Adam Gaffney via The New Republic on September 23, 2016
Valium pills
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Mother's Little Helper

How feminists transformed Valium from a wonder drug to a symbol of medical sexism.
via BackStory on May 20, 2016
An open hand holds a variety of pills and supplements.

Supplement History: The Truth About Supplements and Vitamins That Teens Should Know

A lack of regulatory oversight of supplements allows misleading labels and dangerous products to slip through the cracks and into American homes.
by Sarah DiGregorio via Teen Vogue on July 31, 2025
A nurse passing a cup with methadone through a glass window.
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History Exposes the Flaw in RFK Jr.'s Drug Treatment Plan

Kennedy wants to create "wellness drug rehabilitation farms." But the U.S. tried it before, and it didn't work.
by Melody Glenn via Made By History on January 30, 2025
Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter address children at a Ghana hospital in 2007.

How Jimmy Carter's Global Health Efforts Elevated 'The Art of the Possible'

Former President Jimmy Carter, who died Sunday at age 100, gave visibility to devastating health problems that are often invisible.
by Helen Branswell via STAT on December 29, 2024
A photograph of the massive AIDS memorial quilt with the Washington Monument in the background.

“I Am the Face of AIDS”

Ryan White helped challenge existing understandings of the AIDS epidemic. But his story also reinforced arbitrary divisions between the guilty and the innocent.
by Paul M. Renfro via Public Books on October 22, 2024
A stylized drawing of an insulin vial.

The Insulin Empire

Insulin transforms a sick body. It also has the potential to reconstitute our political economic realities.
by Edward Ongweso Jr., Athena Sofides via The Baffler on May 30, 2024
A newspaper article from the Inner City Voice in Detroit with the headline, "Black Workers Uprising."

Acid Rhythms

A look at the psychedlic-inspired music scene of Detroit.
by William Harris via n+1 on April 10, 2024
Pregnant woman.

What the Shadowy History of Women’s Health Tells Us About Its Uncertain Future

Clare Beams on the dark legacy of a purported pregnancy miracle drug.
by Clare Beams via Literary Hub on April 9, 2024
Image of a joint sticking out of the sidewalk in a suburban neighborhood.

The Suburbs Made the War on Drugs in Their Own Image

Matthew Lassiter’s history plays out in ranch houses, high school parking lots, and courtrooms from Shaker Heights to Westchester to Orange County.
by Claire Bond Potter via The New Republic on February 27, 2024
Mead reading a book, against a psychedelic background.

One of Our Most Respected 20th-Century Scientists Was LSD-Curious. What Happened?

A document in her papers in the Library of Congress sheds new light on postwar research on psychedelics.
by Benjamin Breen via Slate on February 10, 2024
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How Liberal Policymakers and White Suburban Parents Drove the War on Drugs

A Q&A with Matthew Lassiter about how liberal policymakers and white parents drove the escalation of the War on Drugs.
by Matthew D. Lassiter, Michan Connor via HNN on January 10, 2024
Ronald Reagan signing anti-drug legislation as Nancy Reagan and legislators look on.
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America's War on Drugs Was Always Bipartisan—And Unwinnable

There was really only one big difference between liberal drug warriors and conservative ones.
by Matthew D. Lassiter via Made By History on December 7, 2023
Sly Stone with daughter Nove, ca. 1980.

On the Sly

A memoir of the Family Stone.
by Carl Wilson via Bookforum on December 4, 2023
ACT UP protesters demanding the release of experimental medication for those living with HIV/AIDS.

Patient Rights Groups Are Learning the Wrong Lessons From ACT UP

These groups are invoking ACT UP's legacy to push for further deregulation of the FDA. Here's why they're wrong.
by Gregg Gonsalves via The Nation on November 9, 2023
Hand facing palm up and holding three pills.

Unreasonable Terms

How American drug companies have exploited government contracts to pursue profit over public interest.
by Daniel J. Kevles via New York Review of Books on October 5, 2023
From left: schoolchildren, their teacher, and Nancy Reagan look on as a police officer talks about the DARE program

The Kids Who Snitched on Their Families Because DARE Told Them To

The program was about education. But it was also about surveillance.
by Max Felker-Kantor via Slate on September 30, 2023
Police and bystanders at night.

Do Cartels Exist?

A revisionist view of the drug wars.
by Rachel Nolan via Harper’s on June 20, 2023
Artistic representation of a man using psychedelics. The man's head appears like a matryoshka doll.

Brains on Drugs

Between the mid-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, drug use to expand one’s consciousness went from an intellectual pastime to an emblem of social decay.
by John Semley via The Baffler on June 14, 2023
A picture of switchboard operators.

Intimacy at a Distance

Hannah Zeavin’s history of remote and distance psychotherapy asks us whether the medium matters more than the message.
by Danielle Carr via The Nation on June 14, 2022
Bleachman, a mascot created by the San Francisco AIDS Foundation as a part of a campaign directed at drug users and intended to help slow the transmission of HIV in needle-using communities, 1988.

What We Can Learn From Harm Reduction’s Defeats

The history of the movement is one of unlikely success. But what can we learn from embattled experiments like prescribed heroin? 
by Sessi Kuwabara Blanchard via The Nation on February 15, 2022
Illustration of burning cannabis with helicopters overhead

The Cold War Killed Cannabis As We Knew It. Can It Rise Again?

Somewhere in Jamaica survive the original cannabis strains that were not burned by American agents or bred to be more profitable.
by Casey Taylor via Defector on January 11, 2022
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