How to "eat" poisonous mushrooms in the name of science? Psychedelic mushrooms: Thanks for the invitation

"Red umbrella, white pole, let's lie down on the board together after eating."

After the ER song was sung, poisonous mushrooms suffered a reputational setback.

But today we are going to talk about how poisonous mushrooms have justified their reputation on their own (or maybe just thought about it).

Poisonous mushroom Amanita muscaria, picture source: pexels

Let me ask you, what are the three conditions for eating poisonous mushrooms?

——"Fried", "Cooked", "The way to the hospital is familiar"

Every year, there are many cases of people lying on emergency beds and fighting with alien creatures due to accidentally ingesting poisonous mushrooms.

But recently there is a piece of news that has made the whole world "joyful". The problem of depression treatment, which has always been difficult to overcome, has found the unlocking code from psychedelic mushrooms (the poisonous mushrooms mentioned above). The unlocking code is a substance, which is "psilocybin". It is a toxin with neuropsychedelic effects and exists in psychedelic mushrooms.

Screenshot from Scientist Magazine

Psychedelic mushrooms, also known as "sacred mushrooms", have been used in certain religious ceremonies of indigenous Mexicans for hundreds of years. Since the 1970s, many young people in the United States, Canada, Britain, Germany and other European countries have generally consumed mushrooms containing such toxins for recreation. However, long-term or excessive use of such substances can cause neurotoxicity, and these mushrooms are listed as controlled substances in the United States.

Psilocybin is the psychoactive ingredient in "hallucinogenic mushrooms" and is a Class I controlled drug in my country. This means that it currently has no legal medical use and has a high risk of abuse. But in the field of cutting-edge medicine, scientists have been studying the possibility of using it to treat chronic depression.

Wild mushrooms, image source: pexels

Clinical studies have shown that psilocybin extracted from hallucinogenic mushrooms can greatly improve the symptoms of depression patients within one day, and the effect can last for more than three months.

In 2017, researchers at Imperial College London gave psilocybin to 19 people with depression. All volunteers observed fewer depressive symptoms after a week, and "47% of patients showed significant relief after 5 weeks."

In addition, psilocybin can also assist in quitting smoking and alleviating the pain of cancer patients.

Wild mushrooms, image source: pexels

In this case, do you feel that psilocybin is as beautiful as an angel?

In fact, chemical compounds are not equivalent to drugs. Researchers still need to conduct a lot of experimental verification before they can become good drugs that can benefit patients as soon as possible.

Currently, it is a Class I controlled drug in almost all countries and regions around the world, which means that it has no legal medical use and has a high risk of abuse: trying hallucinogens at will may bring unbearable costs, including the end of life.

The worst incident involving hallucinogenic mushroom consumption occurred in the Netherlands in 2007.

A 17-year-old French girl traveled to Amsterdam, bought "magic mushrooms" at a convenience store and ran to the roof of the Nemo Building. After eating them, she had hallucinations and lost control of herself, and fell to her death from the building. Afterwards, the Dutch government introduced relevant policies in response to this incident, and imposed legal and regulatory restrictions on the sale and consumption of hallucinogenic mushrooms.

Although psilocybin in hallucinogenic mushrooms has significant effects in treating patients with depression, for ordinary people like us, the risks of eating poisonous mushrooms are very huge.

The most common adverse reactions are extreme anxiety or short-term psychosis, or experiencing feelings of despair, confusion, paranoia, anxiety, or panic; difficulty adapting to reality may occur after taking psilocybin for a few days; some people may experience persistent, distressing changes in the way they see the world, which can last from weeks to years.

The drug psilocybin seized by the police. Photo provided by the police. See the watermark for the source.

At the same time, follow-up studies by medical institutions have shown that psilocybin is not addictive and no physical reactions occur after cessation of use.

Finally, it is worth reminding everyone that in order to prevent poisoning or breaking the law, or even threatening one's life, from eating hallucinogenic mushrooms, the most fundamental approach is not to actively eat them. If you accidentally eat them, the best way is to seek professional medical help as soon as possible to avoid delaying the disease.

As the saying goes, curiosity kills the cat. Tadpole hopes that everyone will look forward to major breakthroughs in the application of psilocybin in the treatment of depression, instead of thinking about "testing the poison on themselves"!

END

Review expert: Wang Guoyi, postdoctoral fellow in food safety.

Tadpole Musical Notation original article, please indicate the source when reprinting

Editor/Heart and Paper