Psilocybin and Mental Health
The Indigenous people of Oaxaca, also known as the Zapotec, once believed that fungi would emerge as a response to lightning striking the Earth. Now, we know this is not the case but rather, mushrooms exist to release spores into the environment, but why some produce psilocybin has yet to be explained. While bad trips and Woodstock have created a stigma around Magic Mushrooms, psilocybin (magic mushrooms) can be used to treat various mental health illnesses, through the testing, the psilocybin in the mushrooms was observed to have contended against addiction, OCD, etc. Psilocybin was tested for a short period of time but needs more trials and testing to be done.
Mushrooms of the psychedelic variety have been ingested by humans for over 9,000 years. The main psychoactive ingredient in these mushrooms is called psilocybin. When ingested, the body breaks it down into the active drug psilocin, which makes its way to the bain. In the brain, it begins to prevent the reuptake of the neurotransmitter serotonin, increasing its activity. The compound psilocin has a similar chemical structure to serotonin, meaning it can also bind to and stimulate receptors in the brain. This amplified stimulation causes you to perceive and experience things without any real stimulus, also known as hallucinations. These will be of a varied nature, from visual to auditory sensations, or mystical and insightful feelings.
In the 1950s and 60s, psychedelics were considered to be a promising potential treatment for numerous mental health disorders and illnesses, with more than 1,000 studies taking place at the time. Events like Woodstock created a large backlash and stigma to the abuse of psychedelics in that period. This response resulted in any funding for these studies to dry up, and research came to an abrupt halt. This stigma resulted in press coverage that often times focused on bad trips rather than scientific development. Due to fear and growing moral panic, psychedelic drugs became illegal and classified as a Schedule 1 drug.
Many scientists, when gifted with special government permission, have turned their attention to the compound known as psilocybin which is what makes the mushrooms “magic”. In the mid-2000s, the drug hit a peak of interest with the scientific at Johns Hopkins University. Studies from this university found that the compound psilocybin showed promise for treating addiction, OCD, anxiety, and in some cases, depression. In a study of 12 advanced cancer patients suffering from end-of-life anxiety, 80% of participants who took psilocybin generally showed lower scores on a test of depression. One small study of 15 smokers found that more than 90% were able to abstain from smoking for six months after treatment of psilocybin. A smaller study suggested psilocybin treatment also help people who suffer from alcohol dependence cut back.
When taking a psychedelic, one can observe a higher degree of connectivity between various parts of the brain, this is not limited to just the visual cortex. This communication within the brain helps make a case for visual hallucinations and plenty of researchers argue that this might explain why psychedelics can overcome serious mental issues and health. These researchers look at psychiatric disorders as the brain being “entrenched in pathology.” Harmful patterns become automated and hard to change, and that's what can make things like anxiety, addiction, and depression very hard to treat. Due to psilocybin, these automated pathways can be easily introduced to completely new connections (shown in image 3).
One of the big remaining questions here is how long these benefits actually last after just a one-time treatment. A review on LSD-assisted psychotherapy and alcoholism found no statistically significant benefits after twelve months, while in a recent study on psilocybin’s effects on depression found that the benefits [of psilocybin after a one time use] dropped significantly off after three months. When using psychedelic drugs there can be some risks, it can be hard to predict a patient’s reaction and some might actually endanger themselves on the substance. Those predisposed to psychotic conditions are especially at risk for having a traumatic experience while on the drug.
It is difficult to draw solid conclusions from the existing studies but there is more than enough promise here to merit further research and further funding for this specific research. As Matthew Johnson of Johns Hopkins said, “these are among the most debilitating and costly disorders known to humankind.” For some people, no existing treatments help, but psychedelics might. One question remains, and that is why so much of this research is so new, when psychedelics have been known about for thousands of years, they can’t be patented, which means that pharmaceutical companies do not really have any incentive to fund any research into them. This leaves it up to governments and private contributors to fund all these studies and that is why it has only been recently that research is happening, with private, non-government contributions.
Longer and larger studies must be conducted to truly know whether psilocybin is the most effective option compared to pre-existing treatments. If trippy psychedelics can help treat and even cure a fraction of these conditions, it is worth the time and money needed for research. We don’t have all the answers as to what exactly these treatments are doing in the brain but they seem to work by providing a meaningful, even mystical experience that leads to lasting changes in a patient’s life.
