Recent headlines have suggested that psilocybin (what many will know as magic mushrooms) genuinely do offer a promising treatment for drug resistant depression. This is undoubtedly good news – but is actually only picking up where research left off 50 years ago.
Psychedelics, of which psilocybin is probably the best known and most studied, have been used since classical times to treat disorders of the brain. The first half of the 20th century saw a renewed interest in them as a subject for research – they proved surprisingly successful in the treatment of alcoholism. Meanwhile books such as Aldous Huxley’s Doors of Perception describing his own experiences under the influence of mescaline (another psychedelic drug) brought them into popular culture. However, all of this came to an end with the Vietnam war.
As the war dragged on through its second decade (it had started in 1955) young Americans, anxious to escape the draft, moved to Californai where they could live the happy life, high on LSD. To stem this flow, the government made the use of all psychedelics illegal and launched a virulent and very successful advertising campaign demonising the drugs. As a result research ground to a halt as, although research was not itself illegal, the fact that the drugs were effectively killed it. Whereas in 1970 there were around 250 psychedelics-related publications a year, in 2016 there were 20.
However, a core group of researchers have continued to champion psychedelics as a way to re-calibrate the brains of those suffering from severe depression. Back in 2018 I reported on a trial run by Professor David Nutt at Imperial College – an early trial which has been virtually replicated by the researchers whose results were reported last week in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Both used relatively high doses of psilocybin (25mg) given in well controlled and supported conditions; both had relatively positive results with approximately 30% of participants having a partial or even total remission of symptoms which lasted for weeks to months and, in a couple of cases, resulted in total remission.
For a more detailed account of the history of the drugs, how they appear to work in the depressed brain and the earlier Imperial College trial, see my post of July 2018. For more details of the current trial, whose researchers are calling for larger and longer trials of this treatment, see here.
Given the limited success achieved by standard medication in cases of severe depression, any alternative, especially an alternative that appears to come with relatively few side effects, is to be welcomed.
Why would a leading KC be taking the government to court over the roll out of 5G?