Better living through chemistry.
Because corrupt Republican President Richard Nixon’s 50-year lost cause, failed social experiment of the “War on Drugs” and Nancy Reagan’s “just say no” have never, and will never, work, nor ever benefited anyone who needed help — only those who perpetuated the war.
And, because no one — NO ONE — has ever said “when I grow up, I want to become an addict,” nor waked up one day and said, “gee… I think I want to become an addict.”
In September 2018, Johns Hopkins researchers suggested that psilocybin should be re-categorized from a schedule I drug — one with no known medical potential — to a schedule IV drug (the lowest classification) such as with prescription sleep aids, but with somewhat tighter control, and summarized their analysis in the October print issue of Neuropharmacology, a peer-review professional journal.
Dr. Matthew W. Johnson, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins is one of the world’s leading researchers, and most published scientists on the effects of psychedelics on humans, and has conducted original and innovative research in the behavioral economics of drug use, addiction, and risk behavior. Dr. Johnson earned his Ph.D. in experimental psychology at the University of Vermont in 2004.
Dr. Johson spoke with JHU reporters about the research, and said, “We want to initiate the conversation now as to how to classify psilocybin to facilitate its path to the clinic and minimize logistical hurdles in the future. We expect these final clearance trials to take place in the next five years or so. We should be clear that psilocybin is not without risks of harm, which are greater in recreational than medical settings, but relatively speaking, looking at other drugs both legal and illegal, it comes off as being the least harmful in different surveys and across different countries. We believe that the conditions should be tightly controlled and that when taken for a clinical reason, it should be administered in a health care setting, monitored by a person trained for that situation.”
One Dose Of Psilocybin Improved Neural Connections Lost In Depression, Study Says
By Joseph Guzman, July 6, 2021
The psychedelic psilocybin mushroom has shown promise in treating depression, and a number of clinical trials into the fungus’s therapeutic effects have been conducted in recent years.
But now, a Yale University study published in the peer reviewed professional journal Neuron July 5, 2021, has shed light on how the compound psilocybin —the active ingredient found in so-called “magic mushrooms” — may produce antidepressant effects.
Researchers administered a single dose of psilocybin to mice and used a laser-scanning microscope to visualize dendritic spines in the rodents’ brains in high resolution. Dendritic spines are small protrusions found on nerve cells that play a key role in transmitting information between neurons. Previous laboratory experiments demonstrated promise that psilocybin, and the anesthetic ketamine, could decrease depression.
Stress and depression degrade and reduce the number of neuronal connections.
Within 24 hours of the single psychedelic dose, researchers observed an immediate and lasting increase in Read the rest of this entry »
Photo by: Clem Britt/Associated Press