Scientists have stumbled across a new medicinal benefit of the drug propranolol. This medication has been shown to erase memory.
The drug belongs to a family of medications known as beta-adrenergic receptor blockers, also known as blood pressure medications.
It is thought that such medications could be useful in the treatment of post-traumatic stress syndrome which have been triggered by stressful life events such as war and sexual violence. Of course, there are ethicists that see problems with this medical treatment in that erasing memory changes what it means to be human. In addition, they feel that patients may request these types of drugs to erase memories so that they do not have to testify in court.
