The recently released Hemby study : https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/adb.12639 published in Addiction Biology sent shock waves through the FDA corridors with the finding that mitragynine, the major alkaloid in kratom, “does not have an abuse potential and reduces morphine intake” which is exactly the pharmacologic activity for “candidate pharmacotherapies for opiate addiction and withdrawal.” This study directly challenges the…
Working backwards, they discovered that psychedelic-users were not at an increased risk of developing eleven key indicators of serious mental health problems. A second study done at the University of Alabama and Johns Hopkins confirmed this finding. This study used the National Survey as core data, but examined responses from 2008 to 2012. Here too,…
“Alcoholism is PTSD as far as I’m concerned …the vast majority of my patients with alcohol and other addictions are essentially ‘PTSD plus.’” -Dr. Ben Sessa He started to numb his anxiety with alcohol and prescription drugs and almost killed himself accidentally about 10 times before his family intervened. He tried to go to talk…
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has denied a request from an anti-legalization group to place marijuana and its derivatives on a list of restricted substances that are not “generally recognized as safe and effective.” The organization had filed its petition requesting the cannabis crackdown in December 2017, writing that the move would “send…
[Tom] Eckert doesn’t believe that trying to incorporate psilocybin into existing medical and pharmaceutical models will work. To the contrary, he thinks it will zap the substance of what makes it so powerfully effective. Eckert is strict in clarifying that OPS is not proposing a full-fledged legalization effort. Instead, he is focused on what he…
Toward the end of [Michael Pollan’s] book, he reports on a psychedelic-research meeting attended by Thomas Insel, former head of the National Institute of Mental Health. Insel was impressed by evidence of psychedelics’ mental-health benefits but warned researchers, “Don’t screw it up!” Pollan seems to have taken this message to heart. He could have derailed…
We are now hearing calls to increase psychedelics’ clinical availability; i.e., “legalizing psychedelics.” … Most important, only those with specialized training would be allowed to administer psychedelics to humans. Psychedelics possess unique characteristics that do not fit neatly into the criteria used to define schedule placement. Their safety and efficacy [ideally] exist… within highly structured specialized…
“One way to think about that is, it’s not the drug that’s having the useful effect for the addict… it’s the experience that the drug is giving them.” -Michael Pollan One Pollan tidbit that’s grabbed attention on his press tour is a revelation about Bill Wilson, the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous. Wilson partially credits his…
Cannabis prohibition is, and always has been, unconstitutional as well as irrational and unscientific. Alcohol prohibition only covered commercial activities, citizens’ rights to produce, possess and consume alcohol on private property were not included, and that prohibition required a constitutional amendment. There are more than sufficient laws and regulations to deal with commercial cannabis activity…
Some cannabis accelerators have shied away from working with businesses that have direct contact with weed, fearing federal crackdowns on legal markets. The Initiative will welcome them… wants to focus on making sure women CEOs keep a stake in cannabis—a disproportionately white and male industry. “This is absolutely businesses that are touching the plant,” Margolis…
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