"Of the more than 12,000 people who reported taking psilocybin hallucinogenic mushrooms in 2016, just 0.2% of them said they needed emergency medical treatment – a rate at least five times lower than that for MDMA, LSD and cocaine."
“Magic mushrooms are one of the safest drugs in the world,” said Adam Winstock, a consultant addiction psychiatrist and founder of the Global Drug Survey....
“Death from toxicity is almost unheard of with poisoning with more dangerous fungi being a much greater risk in terms of serious harms.”
What about the problem of people foraging for hallucinogenic mushrooms and picking toxic mushrooms by mistake? It doesn't sound as though the study counts that against hallucinogenic mushrooms. But I guess all of these statistics are complicated by the illegality of the drug. When is the visit to the emergency room because of something that could have been avoided if the drug were sold legally, with assurances of purity and known doses?
“Drug laws need to balance the positives and problems they can create in society and well crafted laws should nudge people to find the right balance for themselves,” said Winstock.
“People don’t tend to abuse psychedelics, they don’t get dependent, they don’t rot every organ from head to toe, and many would cite their impact upon their life as profound and positive. But you need to know how to use them.”
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34 comments:
Althouse poll suggestion, how many have tried "Magic Mushrooms"
“People don’t tend to abuse psychedelics, they don’t get dependent, they don’t rot every organ from head to toe, and many would cite their impact upon their life as profound and positive. But you need to know how to use them.”
As predicted, people are taking the successful arguments made by the marijuana lobby to argue for a whole host of drugs to be legalized.
It is also true that someone with a clean, cheap, and sustainable supply of heroin can be a very productive individual in society. You know, if we're going to go down that road.
Sure. Go into the forest and pick some mushrooms. They're not all poisonous.
So I was not, after all, taking a walk on the wild side.
Tony Terrell Robinson Jr. and Madison Police Officer Matt Kenny might disagree about the safety of mushroom consumption.
I tried some recreational drugs back when I was in high school.
I do remember one night with some friends taking mushrooms. It was fun. Probably the most positive experience with nothing but laughs.
I smoked some Marijuana on weekends my last year of high school. After one seriously bad trip -- that was the end of marijuana use for me. (read MoDo's pot-candy Denver experience as example)
I tired coke once. I understood immediately why the drug is so addictive. It's the confidence drug. The day after, the downer is horrible. Don't ever do coke.
At this stage of my life, recreational drugs hold ZERO appeal.
Ah, but the young man in Madison who took them, had a manic episode, and wound up dead - was not available for sampling.
Really? This is hardly very good data.
Sure. Go into the forest and pick some mushrooms. They're not all poisonous.
There is a limited supply of donor livers available.
Sane people use drugs sanely. There's a certain portion of the population that's eager to go to hell in a handbasket. They will ruin their livers on dandelion wine if that's the only thing available......In later life, I've never indulged in recreational drugs, but I have had to use opioids on occasion. I didn't like the foggy feeling, and constipation doesn't expand the boundaries of awareness. I always get off them in a hurry.........Freud was an eminent physician and an early pioneer in the exploration of psychotropic drugs. He was, at one time, utterly convinced of the salubrious effects of cocaine on the human psyche. He thought that that was going to be his big breakthrough in medicine, the one that would cause people to honor and revere his name. He later changed his mind. His research findings were tainted by the fact that he was high on cocaine when he discovered the marvelous qualities of that drug. Perhaps these scientists wrote up their findings in a similar state.
No mention of tobacco/nicotine?
MaxedOutMama said...
Really? This is hardly very good data.
Robinson was on xanax, which really does make people go crazy, especially with a little alcohol.
Heroin, other opiates and 'script drugs are not mentioned either. ???
If you eat right, exercise regularly, and avoid cable news it's generally possible to maintain a reasonably positive attitude towards life. Not much mystique or romance in being addicted to moderation.
Would legalization create a new cadre of litigation attorneys? As in the hypothetical "forthosewhoareinjuredbymushrooms.com" complete with TV ads and, toll free, 1-888-MSH-ROOM...
And remember: All mushrooms are edible, but some will kill you.
"Tony Terrell Robinson Jr. and Madison Police Officer Matt Kenny might disagree about the safety of mushroom consumption."
Good point, and I don't advocate indiscriminate use of recreational drugs (I like to keep myself absolutely undrugged, except for the daily caffeine I need as a night owl to function in a world run by larks), but it seems many of the problems associated with them can be traced to their prohibition and concomitant law-enforcement crackdown.
I wouldn't care to have my car repaired my a mechanic on psychedelic mushrooms. I wouldn't care to be represented in court by an attorney who's taken psychedelic mushrooms. And especially not a surgeon operating on me or anyone I love. The point of these laws isn't just to protect the mushroom eater.
"I wouldn't care to have my car repaired my a mechanic on psychedelic mushrooms."
I recall we were once shooting off machineguns while on psychedelic mushrooms. And alcohol.
Some things are best done once and never again.
BM, What if your firefighter used steroids for the strength needed to carry you out of a burning building, and methamphetaimes or cocaine for the energy to battle the blaze for hours? That would be cheating wouldn't it.
Just say no to drugs.
Big Mike said...
I wouldn't care to have my car repaired my a mechanic on psychedelic mushrooms. I wouldn't care to be represented in court by an attorney who's taken psychedelic mushrooms. And especially not a surgeon operating on me or anyone I love. The point of these laws isn't just to protect the mushroom eater.
5/24/17, 11:52 AM
what happens if your lawyer, surgeon and mechanic show up to work drunk?
Poisonous mushrooms and psychoactive mushrooms look completely different, for the most part.
Mushroom poison guide
Big Mike said...
I wouldn't care to have my car repaired my a mechanic on psychedelic mushrooms. I wouldn't care to be represented in court by an attorney who's taken psychedelic mushrooms. And especially not a surgeon operating on me or anyone I love.
No shit! As you apparently know, that already happens quite often, and without the threat of prison most, perhaps all, doctors, mechanics and lawyers would be eating 'shrooms and every other drug they could get their hands all day long, every day of the year, and twice when you show up.
The point of these laws isn't just to protect the mushroom eater.
Drug laws are a very primitive form of virtual signaling.
What if your surgeon took beta blockers without a prescription? Again, cheating.
I'm a regular (but not frequent) mushroom-eater in my 30s, and I'd just like to put a warning in here: Maybe people don't overdose, but you can DEFINITELY do too much and have a very unpleasant experience indeed. If you're a newbie, start with one cap and one stem, max. Even just one cap is a good start. Even if you don't end up feeling it that much, don't take more. Just accept that as the first experience. You can always do more at a later date.
This is an annual survey? How often do the rankings change?
@vicari, not that either, obviously! But I think I can tell when my doctor is drunk, so what's your point? Once you're sober you're sober. Psychedelics have flashbacks.
Recently male feminist youtuber Aleksandr Kolpakov decided, during a shroom trip, his girlfriend was trying to kill him. So he shot her to death.
Maybe shrooms are the safest drugs to take recreationally, but only for the person actually taking them.
All hallucinogenics do is chemically alter the way that nerve impulses travel in the brain. You may think that you are experiencing a deeper level of reality, but all that is happening in the world of material things is that your brain is acting a little differently. If there is magic in hallucinogenics, there is magic everywhere.
"All hallucinogenics do is chemically alter the way that nerve impulses travel in the brain. You may think that you are experiencing a deeper level of reality, but all that is happening in the world of material things is that your brain is acting a little differently. If there is magic in hallucinogenics, there is magic everywhere."
Well, yes.
(First, there is magic everywhere...most of us tune it out by the time we're grown up.)
Second, the profound thing about hallucinogenic experience is that it reveals vividly that what we think is reality is shaped by the way our brain impulses behave...unique to ourselves. Everyone is literally living in his or her own reality, different to subtle or extravagant degree--depending on the person--from everyone else.
All hallucinogenics do is chemically alter the way that nerve impulses travel in the brain. You may think that you are experiencing a deeper level of reality, but all that is happening in the world of material things is that your brain is acting a little differently.
And that makes unaltered neural functioning special how?
But every boy from central Texas knows where to find them, and also to tip over a cow or two on the way!
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Char Char Binks said...
. . . in a world run by larks . . .
I've thought about running the world as a lark. Decided it wouldn't be.
Some things are best done once and never again.
Yes. I did mushrooms one time -- back around 1999 when I was in my mid-forties.
I remember the experience as extremely pleasant. A buddy and I listened to the same Moody Blues song, oh, about 40 times in a row. Heh. I finally understood what everyone was talking about in the seventies.
Gin and tonic serves now, though.
this make me question how they collected data. you see, a lot of civilian "mushrooms" are actually spiked with LSD or other drugs, and yes, you see bad trips.
On the other hand, when American Indians take the mushrooms at a religious ceremony, you prepare yourself and are surrounded by friends, and one of my Native American friends described it simply a feeing of loving oneness with the deity and your tribe. In other words, a smaller dose in a safe environment.
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