This week Vancouver City Council approved a series of recommendations aimed at regulating the growing number of medical marijuana dispensaries in the city. It is a complicated issue, which is why we at the City of Vancouver have attempted to address some of your most frequently asked questions: Is the retail sale of medical marijuana legal in Vancouver as a result of council's decision? There is no legal regime for the retail sale of marijuana in Canada. People who need marijuana for medicinal purposes and who have a prescription may apply to Health Canada to obtain marijuana from a federally licensed supplier. [continues 528 words]
The Hippies Drug of Choice Was Banned in 1966 but Is Now Undergoing Trials As a Cure for Depression and Addiction. Charlie Cooper Spoke to Some Volunteer Users. LSD is often associated with trippy songs such as "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", "Purple Haze" and "White Rabbit". But before it became the drug of choice for the 1960s counterculture, lysergic acid diethylamide had a previous existence - as an experimental medicine for a broad spectrum of psychological problems ranging from depression and addiction, to schizophrenia and obsessive compulsive disorder. [continues 830 words]
OSLO - In a country so wary of drug abuse that it limits the sale of aspirin, Pal-Orjan Johansen, a Norwegian researcher, is pushing what would seem a doomed cause: the rehabilitation of LSD. It matters little to him that the psychedelic drug has been banned here and around the world for more than 40 years. Mr. Johansen pitches his effort not as a throwback to the hippie hedonism of the 1960s, but as a battle for human rights and good health. [continues 1229 words]
Federal authorities are cracking down on new designer drugs like N-Bomb, also known as "Legal LSD," hoping legislation aimed at making the synthetic hallucinogen illegal to possess in the Bay State will prevent more teen overdose deaths. "There's no such thing as a safe synthetic drug. One dose can kill you," DEA spokesman Anthony Pettigrew said of N-Bomb, a synthetic drug gaining popularity among teens that can appear in a variety of forms. "Anytime someone uses any synthetic drug, including N-Bomb, they're playing Russian roulette." [continues 445 words]
Charlie Cooper Takes a Trip to Meet Professor David Nutt - and Finds Out Why the Former Government Czar Believes That Mind-Altering Drugs Have a Place on the Prescription Pad Professor David Nutt has been no stranger to controversy over the years. So the psychiatrist and former Government drugs tsar, will not have been fazed when he raised eyebrows recently by drawing a parallel between the repression of research into the effects of psychedelic drugs like LSD with the censorship of Galileo and the banning of the telescope. [continues 1114 words]
Long-Lost Promoter Of Vancouver's First Hippie Club Returns With Stories, And Some Amazing Posters The saying goes that if you can remember the '60s, you weren't really there. Jerry Kruz knows this all too well. At 66, his memory of the parties, concerts and happenings he took part in during the hippie era are a bit hazy. But a marvellous thing happens when he looks back at his collection of old psychedelic concert posters. The memories of the shows come floating back, like a contact high. [continues 1704 words]
New Research on Psychedelics Is Unveiling Their Potential for Healing As university students, we know how prevalent substance use is. It's practically impossible to go through your degree (or your day) without being exposed to the use of coffee, energy drinks, alcohol, cigarettes, pot, Ritalin or other drugs for a variety of reasons ranging from partying to relaxing to studying. In our daily lives, the social acceptability of particular drugs is based heavily on stigma and the law, rather than on a sober evaluation of their effects and harms. [continues 738 words]
Op-ed writer Nate Greenslit is exactly correct in arguing that it would benefit the proponents of the use of psychedelics to focus the discussion toward the treatment of medical ailments ("Are psychedelics the next medical marijuana?" Aug. 6). However, unlike medical marijuana, which is primarily being used to treat pain and glaucoma, the benefits to the field of psychotherapy and healing from psychedelics is enormous. Psychedelics actually have the potential cure depression, anxiety, phobias, PTSD and other mental illness. Psychedelics, specifically natural plant ethnobotanicals like ayahuasca, have also been demonstrated to be effective in treating alcohol and drug addiction. Medical studies being conducted at Johns Hopkins and New York University suggest that both psilocybin and MDMA therapy help in the treatment of imminent death related anxiety. [continues 66 words]
Mental health. Local psychologist lauds banned drug's efficacy A Vancouver psychologist wants Health Canada to make LSD legally available to psychologists and psychiatrists for their patients. "The use of LSD as a therapeutic adjunct speeds up psychotherapy," Andrew Feldmar said. He claims that the drug allows patients to remember early childhood experiences and reprogram their brain. Feldmar, who is also studying the impact of MDMA, a form of ecstasy, on patients with post-traumatic stress disorder, said LSD has the potential to help patients with the most severe cases of depression to become completely cured of the mood disorder after taking LSD. [continues 323 words]
He heard about the drug trial from a friend in Switzerland and decided it was worth volunteering, even if it meant long, painful train journeys from his native Austria and the real possibility of a mental meltdown. He didn't have much time, after all, and traditional medicine had done nothing to relieve his degenerative spine condition. "I'd never taken the drug before, so I was feeling - well, I think the proper word for it, in English, is dread," said Peter, 50, an Austrian social worker, in a telephone interview; he asked that his last name be omitted to protect his identity. "There was this fear that it could all go wrong, that it could turn into a bad trip." [continues 803 words]
What: T.J. Dawe's Medicine When: Friday and Saturday, 7 p.m. (also tonight at the Nanaimo Art Gallery, 150 Commercial St.) Where: Metro Studio, 1411 Quadra St. Tickets: $20 advance ($25 door) www.eventbrite.ca For Vancouver actor/writer T.J. Dawe, it's been one long, strange trip indeed. The University of Victoria theatre grad brings his latest one-man show, Medicine, to the Metro Studio this weekend. The autobiographical piece details his experiences with a psychedelic concoction known as ayahuasca. [continues 615 words]
NORTHUMBERLAND COUNTY - It's on the street, it's dangerous and it's legal. It's called salvia divinorum, and comes in different strengths. There is "standardized" salvia and there is "extreme" salvia that says "horse killer" on the package. But there are many other forms. "It is called 'horse killer' because of its extra ordinary power and deep trip," it says on the back of the package. Though packages say the product is for incense only, on the street people are smoking it like marijuana. [continues 665 words]
It's on the street, it's dangerous and it's legal. It's called salvia divinorum, and comes in different strengths. There is "standardized" salvia and there is "extreme" salvia that says "horse killer" on the package. But there are many other forms. "It is called 'horse killer' because of its extraordinary power and deep trip," it says on the back of the package. Though packages say the product is for incense only, on the street people are smoking it like marijuana. [continues 647 words]
Lady Neidpath, Who Once Drilled a Hole in Her Own Head, Is Dead Serious About Drugs. Nick Curtis Hears Why Our Fear of Illegal Highs Means We Could Be Missing Out on Cures for Depression I DO NOT doubt for one moment the absolute sincerity of the drugs campaigner Amanda Feilding, aka Lady Neidpath, Countess of Wemyss and March. Nor the good sense in her argument that narcotics should be scientifically studied, decriminalised, and licensed and regulated by the state for medical or recreational use as appropriate - a "sensible" alternative to the vast waste of lives and money in the unwinnable War on Drugs. But I can see how easy it is for her opponents to demonise the 70-year-old as a batty aristo. [continues 1565 words]
With a Big Bust in January and a Major Conference This Fall, We've Been Psychedelicized IT TOOK A POLICE battering ram to bust down the door of the West Philadelphia apartment. Once inside, police discovered a colorful cache of psychedelic drugs - enough LSD to open thousands of "doors of perception" for six to eight hours at a time. The Jan. 31 raid appeared to be a true flashback to a bygone era, with the federal Drug Enforcement Administration calling the 9,500 hits of LSD on tie-dyed images of Homer Simpson and Jerry Garcia an "anomaly" in Philadelphia. And since two of the five suspects arrested were Drexel students, the raid became known as the "Drexel LSD bust" in the media, with reporters interviewing students and getting statements from university officials. [continues 1170 words]
Hallucinogen May Help Alcoholics Give Up the Drink New research analyzing data from studies conducted between 1966 and 1970 suggests LSD may help alcoholics quit and remain sober. In a study that appeared in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, researchers from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology took a fresh look at data from six different studies conducted in the United States and Canada, according to Health.com. The researchers concluded a single dose of the hallucinogen helped heavy alcoholics quit and reduced their risk of relapse. In addition, 59 percent of patients showed a clear improvement after receiving a full dose of LSD, compared to 38 percent of patients who did not take the drug. Study authors Teri Krebs and Pal-Orjan Johansen speculated the results were linked to LSD's effect on serotonin receptors in the brain. "LSD may stimulate the formation of new connections and patterns, and generally seems to open an individual to an awareness of new perspectives and opportunities for action," wrote Krebs and Johansen. [end]
Is dropping acid a reasonable way to deal with a drinking problem? Researchers from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology's department of neuroscience think there's some merit to the idea. They've gone through data from experiments conducted in the 1960s and 1970s, and say there is evidence that subjects given LSD were more likely to make progress in dealing with a harmful alcohol habit. Their paper, published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, took a broad look at six different experimental trials, including one in Canada in 1966, involving 536 subjects being treated for alcohol problems. [continues 288 words]
To legalize or not to legalize? The question of marijuana's safety, its impacts on society and its potential as a government revenue source has probably never been so hotly debated in the mainstream of public opinion. We've been waging war on the drug trade for decades, and what has it gotten us? Prisons full of drug users and street-corner dealers, an ever-increasing enforcement bill that cuts deeply into other services, and a murderous drug cartel to the south that threatens to turn Mexico into a full-blown narco state. Today, even "respectable" people feel the burden of those hard truths. [continues 1664 words]
A MIDDLE-AGED Shaman from Buckfastleigh faces a possible jail term after being convicted of producing and supplying a class A drug at a healing ceremony. Peter Aziz conjured up two brews of sacred drink from jungle plants for religious rituals at a disused hotel, Bristol Crown Court heard. Aziz said he didn't realise that one ingredient - the leaf of the Chakruna plant - contained controlled the drug N-dimethyltriptamene or DMT. The 51 year old denied two counts of producing a class A drug and two counts of supplying a class A drug. [continues 295 words]
To the Editor: Re "Electric Kool-Aid Marketing Trip" (Op-Ed, March 19): Michael Walker has written an encomium to Augustus Owsley Stanley III, the "LSD millionaire" who figured out how to manufacture the drug in industrial doses in San Francisco in the mid-1960s. Without question, Mr. Stanley was a key figure in the Sixties counterculture and played a large role in the music, art and "Summer of Love" ethos associated with LSD. But virtually every obituary of Mr. Stanley has romanticized his legacy. Consider how many bad trips, suicides and ruined lives that legacy was also responsible for. Cory Franklin Wilmette, Ill., March 19, 2011 [end]
