Detroit and Seattle, North American cities best known to Brazilians for their role in pop music, have joined the list of municipalities whose police will no longer pursue those who use psychedelics. They will then join Denver, Santa Cruz, Oakland, Ann Arbor, Cambridge, Sommerville and Northampton.
At the regional level, similar legislation was adopted in Oregon and Washington (DC). California and Colorado may soon follow suit, relegating substances such as psilocybin (‘magical’ mushrooms), ayahuasca, ibogaine and mescaline to the lowest priority status for police repression if they are not intended for the illegal trade.
It is not, therefore, about legalization, but about guiding law enforcement agents to stop arresting people with small amounts of these consciousness-altering drugs. The flagship of campaigns promoted by organizations such as Decriminalize Nature has been psilocybin, with its recognized therapeutic potential (more on the substance at the end of the text).
This is what is called adult use. The changes reflect scientific evidence that classic psychedelics such as mescaline, LSD, psilocybin and dimethyltryptamine (DMT, from ayahuasca) have a manageable toxicological profile, are not addictive and do have medical potential. Which is not to say that they have no contraindications and that they can be used by anyone; it is not recommended, for example, for those with a personal or family history of psychosis.
These new norms generally use the term “entheogens”, from Greek radicals for something like “generator of (divine) inspiration”, and not “psychedelics”. It alludes to the ancestral uses of plants and fungi in ceremonies, which militants consider a fundamental right.
The measure passed in Seattle says that “entheogens have been recognized as sacred to human cultures around the world for centuries, and continue to be revered and used to this day by venerable and sincere cultural and spiritual leaders and communities throughout the world and the United States. ”.
In Oregon, in 2020, by 56% of the popular vote, Measure 109, which creates a state psychotherapy program with the psychoactive mushroom of the genus, was approved. Psilocybe. The same election endorsed Measure 110 (Law on Treatment and Recovery from Drug Addiction), which decriminalizes the personal possession of various substances, including MDMA, LSD, ketamine, methamphetamine and heroin.
In the case of Seattle, only the use of synthetic mescaline was regulated, which is not obtained directly from peyote, a slow-breeding cactus that grows in the southwest of the USA and Mexico and is at risk of extinction in the wild if it is collected intensively. It’s a victory for Native American groups, like Native American Church practitioners, who fear for their sacred plant.
Psilocibina x MDMA
British company Compass Pathways, controversial for its patents on psilocybin in psychotherapy for depression, has announced that it will carry out a phase 2 clinical trial on treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with the same drug. There will be 20 patients in the study by King’s College London.
The same disorder is the subject of the most advanced clinical trial of psychedelic for PTSD, phase 3, with the empathogen MDMA (or ecstasy, which causes no visual effects), sponsored by the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies. The Psylocybin alpha Bulletin heard about Rick Doblin, leader of the entity better known by the English acronym Maps.
Rick said he does not see psilocybin for PTSD as a competitor, as it is about maximizing benefits for patients: “I welcome Compass’s research into psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy for PTSD, as well as research into ketamine, ibogaine and other treatments.”
Maps itself investigates the use of marijuana for PTSD in 300 war veterans, with funding of US$12.9 million (more than R$70 million). Rick is interested in the idea of comparing and detailing the effects of both drugs, including to investigate the possibility of associating them in successive phases of treatment, or even together, in what is known as “candy-flipping”.
“It is our opinion that MDMA-assisted therapy is likely to be safer and more effective than psilocybin-assisted therapy for PTSD, or LSD, because of the fear-reducing properties of MDMA. However, this is an empirical question that needs to be resolved through research, which is why we welcome the Compass study,” the Maps leader told the newsletter.
Read more about psychedelics in the book:
(Reproduction)
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