My Twitter feed notified me today that some new Psilocybin research has landed. The tweet pointed off to the Journal of Psychopharmacology. With an editorial and a couple of papers covering research into Psilocybin. One of the papers being "Psilocybin produces substantial andsustained decreases in depression andanxiety in patients with life-threateningcancer: A randomized double-blind trial" and the other "Rapid and sustained symptom reductionfollowing psilocybin treatment for anxiety anddepression in patients with life-threateningcancer: a randomized controlled trial" .
Pretty interesting articles. With the Guardian website covering the research in a format more digestible by lay people.
A single dose of psilocybin, the active ingredient of magic mushrooms, can lift the anxiety and depression experienced by people with advanced cancer for six months or even longer, two new studies show.
Researchers involved in the two trials in the United States say the results are remarkable. The volunteers had “profoundly meaningful and spiritual experiences” which made most of them rethink life and death, ended their despair and brought about lasting improvement in the quality of their lives.
The results of the research are published in the Journal of sychopharmacology together with no less than ten commentaries from leading scientists in the fields of psychiatry and palliative care, who all back further research. While the effects of magic mushrooms have been of interest to psychiatry since the 1950s, the classification of all psychedelics in the US as schedule 1 drugs in the 1970s, in the wake of the Vietnam war and the rise of recreational drug use in the hippy counter-culture, has erected daunting legal and financial obstacles to running trials.
In addition, I wandered into one of the research papers quoted in one of the above papers. "Johnson M, Richards W, Griffiths R (2008) Human hallucinogen research: guidelines for safety. J Psychopharmacology 22: 603-620 (PDF)"
Which is a useful article for anyone who is wondering how to encourage a harm reduction approach to anyone who may be considering taking a Magic Mushroom trip,
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