It took more than a year for the trial at St Vincent’s Hospital to secure approval from the ethics committee and federal and state authorities. It’s now due to begin in April with 30 patients.
Participants will be given single does of synthetic ‘psilocybin’, a psychoactive ingredient found in mushrooms, which has been found to unlock part of the brain to alter the user’s outlook.
Benefits of the treatment can last for six months or more. St Vincent’s Hospital say three out of 10 patients in palliative care suffer from extreme distress in their final months, which they’re hoping will be significantly reduced with the psilocybin dose.
The trial’s approval was helped by a recent study at John Hopkins University in the US, which found people suffering from cancer-related anxiety or depression had significant relief after taking one large dose of psilocybin.
Late last year, six months into the Hopkins study, researchers found 80 percent of their 51 participants had significant decreases in depression and anxiety.
The trial also found users enjoyed an increased quality of life after receiving the dosage, with two-thirds of participants citing the aftermath as one of the top five most meaningful experiences in their lives.
As the world population of honey bees continues to decline at a dangerous rate, a new study suggests that mushrooms could have a powerful effect on bees by helping them combat the viruses that have been killing their colonies.
This week, it was announced that a startup called Compass Pathways has received approval from The Food and Drug Administration to develop treatments for depression, and possibly even pharmaceuticals, with psilocybin, the active ingredient in psychedelic “magic mushrooms.”
Much like the carefully orchestrated de-legalization of cannabis during the 1930’s, there was a powerful decades-long misleading campaign against psilocybin mushrooms which caused a deep-rooted fear and a subsequent public rejection of this substance.
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