ONLY 1 STEP? –
May 19, 2025 – Under bright surgical lights, a surgeon makes a steady incision just over a centimeter long in Yuan Qizhi’s navel before implanting 10 white pellets — each the size of a soybean, into the subcutaneous tissue.
The entire process takes less than 20 minutes, but it could just save this 56-year-old’s life.
For more than 30 years, Yuan has been fighting a losing battle with alcohol. The implants he’s just received are sustained-release naltrexone hydrochloride, also known as the “sobriety chip,” a prescription medication used to treat alcoholic disorder.The drug will circulate his body before eventually crossing the blood-brain barrier, ultimately inhibiting the surges in dopamine and other pleasure-related neurotransmitters that come from consuming alcohol. Theoretically, it can block a person’s neural reward mechanism for up to 150 days.
