Hallucinogenic mushrooms and LSD soon on prescription?

Psilocybe mexicana photographed in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico.

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• Scientists are once again interested in the virtues of psychedelics, according to a study published by our partner The Conversation.

• LSD and psilocybin extracted from hallucinogenic mushrooms act in the brain on the serotonin receptor.

• The history of these phenomena was analyzed by Vincent Verroust, associate researcher at the Institute of Humanities in Medicine (Lausanne) and doctoral student in the history of science at the École des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (Paris).

From the 1950s and 1960s, a few teams of scientists began to evaluate the therapeutic potential of psychotropic substances known as “psychedelics”, such as LSD, discovered in 1943, or psilocybin extracted from hallucinogenic mushrooms.

The book

(translated into French under the title

) by Michael Pollan, professor of journalism at the University of California at Berkeley, tells the story of these pioneers.

In this book, which helped publicize this research in the Anglo-Saxon world, Michael Pollan does not hesitate to get involved in the investigation, by testifying to his own trips.

He follows in this one of the rules of "New journalism" decreed by the writer and journalist Tom Wolfe, author in 1968 of a cult book on psychedelics,

.

But the comparison ends there: while Tom Wolfe narrated the discovery of the use of LSD outside the medical framework by American youth in the 1960s, Michael Pollan uses his expertise as a science journalist to tell the story history from the point of view of scientists working in the tightly framed context of medical research.

Where do these products come from?

Do they have therapeutic virtues?

Why was research on psychedelics abandoned for almost 30 years, until their rediscovery in the mid-1990s?

Back to these key questions, while we are seeing a certain revival of interest in the medical potential of psychedelics.

From rye ergot to LSD

Michael Pollan began his story in 1943, the year Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann, who worked for the pharmaceutical company Sandoz, unintentionally took

(lysergic acid diethylamide).

He had synthesized this substance while working on an alkaloid of ergot of rye (

), a parasitic fungus which can be at the origin of serious poisonings, formerly called "fire of Saint Anthony" or "ardent sickness. ".

LSD is derived from lysergic acid, a molecule derived from ergot in rye © Letrek / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA

After having inadvertently absorbed his new substance, perhaps by rubbing his eyes, Albert Hofmann understands that it profoundly changes the functioning of his brain, for several hours.

It describes a dreamlike state, kaleidoscopic and colorful visions.

In order to verify, he again takes a dose that he thought - wrongly - small, on April 19, 1943, this time on purpose.

He quickly feels the effects, which he will describe in his book

 : visual disturbances, anxiety, fear of dying or of having gone mad ... Before enjoying a "feeling of happiness" and "the spectacle. incredible shapes and colors ”, multicolored and kaleidoscopic images.

Following this discovery, the Sandoz firm decided to make the molecule available to researchers in order to explore its therapeutic potential.

Singularly in the history of the drug, Sandoz even suggests that doctors test the substance on themselves, to see its effects, which are reflected in particular in an intensification of all sensory perceptions: the colors are perceived as brighter, the nuances are more subtle, the perspectives and the distances are distorted, the sounds become more precise and more difficult to locate, the notion of time changes ...

Magic mushrooms with psilocybin

The story of psilocybin begins a few years later, thanks to Robert Gordon Wasson and Valentina Pavlovna Wasson, a couple of American ethnologists.

In the early 1950s, these founders of "ethnomycology", the discipline which studies the place of mushrooms in different human societies, rediscovered divinatory mushrooms in Mexico.

At the time, the latter were still used by a few isolated Native American peoples.

The Wasson spouses collect in particular from them

, the consumption of which results in drunkenness with bodily relaxation, psychological disorders such as unexplained laughter or changes in sensations and perceptions (the shapes and colors of objects are, for example, altered), temporal and spatial disorientation.

This increase in perceptual power, the effects of which last for several hours, provokes a contemplative attitude.

The mood is, in the majority of cases, euphoric, although some people may experience flashes of anxiety or transient panic attacks.

These effects are mainly due to an active ingredient called psilocybin.

This one will be isolated by Albert Hofmann, again him, thanks to the assistance of Roger Heim, professor at the National Museum of Natural History.

Let's take this opportunity to do justice to the latter for the crucial role he played in the history of psilocybin mushrooms.

Friend of the Wassons, Roger Heim was involved from the start in the rediscovery of the divinatory mushrooms used by the Amerindians of Mexico.

This eminent biologist, specialist in mushrooms, was notably the first to successfully culture it in the laboratory, thus allowing the discovery of psilocybin and psilocin.

These two molecules could perhaps even have been identified at the Museum in Paris and not at Sandoz in Basel: Roger Heim had indeed entrusted his colleague, the chemist Marcel Frèrejacque with a bottle of hallucinogenic mushroom extract so that he could identify them. active subtances.

But, busy with other research, Marcel Frèrejacque had neglected the flask, leaving it on a corner of his laboratory bench, until the day he accidentally dropped it on the tiled floor ...

Angry, Roger Heim sent other mushrooms from his Parisian cultures to the Sandoz laboratory in Basel.

First therapeutic research

From the 1950s and 1960s, scientists began to explore the potential of these newly discovered substances, particularly in the United States.

In particular, they are testing their effects on depression, anxiety, alcoholism, obsessive-compulsive disorders, or even palliative care, with the hope of turning them into drugs.

These pioneers discover in particular that the state of mind of the person and the external conditions play a major role in the course of the session.

This is the reason why, today, the hospital rooms in which the tests take place are arranged in warm places.

Researchers are also discovering the essential role played by “guides”, in other words people accustomed to these substances, who will not leave the subject during his inner journey.

As Michael Pollan writes in

 : "In many ways, psychedelic therapy seemed more like shamanism (...) than modern medicine."

At Johns Hopkins University, the rooms where clinical studies are conducted to determine the effects of psilocybin and other psychedelics have been comfortably furnished © Matthew W. Johnson /

At the time, France was no exception.

As early as 1956, Roger Heim had informed the Academy of Sciences of the discovery of species of hallucinogenic mushrooms used in the divinatory rites of the Mazatec Native Americans.

He kept her regularly informed of the progress of the investigations, as much at the mycological, ethnological, chemical and, of course, psychiatric level.

It is precisely in France that the first clinical trials with psilocybin took place, carried out in 1958 at the Sainte-Anne hospital by Professor Jean Delay and some of his students.

They sometimes obtained spectacular results, as in the case of this catatonic person in whom “the possibility of contact” appeared, or that of this young woman interned for anorexia, depression and compulsive eating disorder, who left. hospital after two injections of psilocybin, of "undeniable therapeutic efficacy".

A small group of convinced

There are two aspects of the taking of psychedelic products that the American researchers who ventured on the trail of these explorations preferred to speak only among themselves.

The first is that the interest of these substances goes far beyond the therapeutic framework.

Some of these experimenters were even convinced that, used appropriately, with support and in the right context, these substances could also be beneficial to anyone who is healthy in body and mind.

The second aspect they discovered during their research is even more "embarrassing": with large doses (taken in the context of well-supervised clinical research), the researchers who experimented with these substances discovered that it is possible to experience a mystical experience.

Oceanic feeling, absorption in a “great whole”, sensation of the “sacred” character of the moment, transcendence of ordinary time and space, unity and beauty of the world, ineffability of experience… They often emerged profoundly transformed.

How, then, to reconcile science, spirituality and politics?

This small group of researchers believed that by treading carefully, it was possible to convince the country's elites of the value of psychedelics.

They hoped that once this step was taken, all of American society could embark on this exciting adventure.

But things did not turn out that way.

The decline of research

It was through one of the members of this small group of people that the scandal happened.

Until then respectable professor-researcher in psychology at Harvard, Timothy Leary "sells the wick".

He roused the media, explained that LSD will cause a revolution in America, advocated chemically induced ecstasy.

And distributes LSD to his students ...

It would, however, no doubt be unfair to make him bear full responsibility for the decline in research on psychedelics in the United States, especially since the latter seems to have mainly ceased because of the Kefauver-Harris amendments of 1962. These laws instituted strict standards for evaluating drug efficacy following the thalidomide scandal, standards that psychedelic research has struggled to meet, due to the unorthodox nature of the treatment.

LSD molecule, represented in topological (left) and three-dimensional (right) form.

© Benjah-bmm27 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA

Still, the research credits on psychedelic products are not renewed.

The 70 research programs therefore stop one after the other.

Countless urban legends on LSD, each more terrifying than the next, are also beginning to spread in the press, because of “bad trips” which would occur in the event of a badly framed take (Albert Hofmann also deplored the use of LSD outside any framework).

Result: despite the publication of more than a thousand scientific articles and the organization of six international congresses between 1950 and 1965, scientific research on these substances then disappeared from the radar.

For over thirty years, it will be as if it never existed.

Some of its pioneers were still alive, however, and they remembered.

The moment of rebirth came: from the mid-1990s, some studies were again authorized.

A new generation of researchers was ready to take up the torch, in the words of one of them, Professor Charles Grob of the Harbor - UCLA Medical Center.

Renewed interest and new results

Current work follows the same lines as those which had begun to be explored in the 1960s. However, they are now carried out with rigor in accordance with contemporary requirements in terms of clinical research and obey, as far as possible, the methodology. of "double blind versus placebo".

For example, studies have focused on cancer patients who have to face the end of their lives.

One or more trips on psilocybin allowed them to radically change their relationship with death, to welcome it without fear and to better take advantage of the time that remained to them.

The use of psilocybin in depression or to quit smoking or alcohol has obtained more than encouraging results, even if few teams are committed in this direction.

In particular, research has shown that LSD and psilocybin, the psychedelics mainly used in clinical trials, act primarily in the brain on the same serotonin receptor (the 5-HT2A receptor).

The most currently prescribed antidepressants also act on the serotonin system, although their effect is obviously not the same.

Inappropriate legislation

Whatever enthusiasm and hopes one can reasonably place on this work, research in the field of psychedelics faces a major obstacle: inadequate legislation.

The current global regime for the prohibition of plants and psychoactive substances is based on three conventions signed by almost all countries.

The so-called “unique” one of 1961 on narcotics, that of 1971 on psychotropic substances, and finally that of 1988 against illicit traffic.

However, in the 1971 convention, psychedelics are classified as dangerous drugs of no therapeutic interest.

This classification, which does not take into account recent scientific results, constitutes a formidable obstacle to the development of research.

The current laws continue to hamper research on substances "without physiological dangers and very slightly addictive" as noted in 2015 the famous scientific medical journal

.

Not only do researchers come up against tedious requests for authorizations when they want to work on these substances, but what is more, when a product is classified as a “narcotic”, we see a reluctance on the part of doctors to use it. 'study or prescribe it.

And this, even though the law allows the production and sale of psychoactive products dangerous to health and addictogenic, such as alcohol or tobacco ...

And tomorrow ?

Psychedelics from mushrooms, cacti and other flowering plants have been known for hundreds or even thousands of years in the Americas.

Let us have a thought for the descendants of colonized peoples who, for some, used them since time immemorial, before seeing themselves dispossessed, by law, of their right to dispose of themselves.

Perhaps this is another role for psychedelics: profoundly transforming social relationships.

A dream ?

Perhaps.

But imagine that patients recently treated for resistant depression with psilocybin at the prestigious Imperial College London seem to have experienced a change in their political views through the psychedelic experience: after their treatment, they would have shown less taste. for authoritarian doctrines and would have developed an increased sense of connection to nature ...

Admittedly, the sample of patients on which this work was carried out is too small (12 people only) for this observation to be reasonably considered to constitute robust experimental evidence.

However, other studies also suggest a tendency among users of psychedelics to adopt a greener lifestyle.

These avenues are in addition to the many others that still remain to be explored.

It remains to be hoped that a young generation of scientists will take up the torch lit in France by Roger Heim, Jean Delay and others, by participating in the exciting adventure of research on these substances.

This will involve not only changes at the political level, but also at the cultural level, for the perception of psychedelics to change.

There is still a long way to go.

It may begin with an inner journey ...

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This analysis was written by Vincent Verroust, associate researcher at the Institute of Humanities in Medicine (Lausanne), doctoral student in the history of science at the École des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (Paris), Alexandre-Koyré center (EHESS-CNRS -MNHN), National Museum of Natural History (MNHN).

The original article was published on The Conversation website.

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