Op-Ed The Harms of Psychedelics Need to Be Put Into Context

[thegreenhand]

The Harms of Psychedelics Need to Be Put Into Context​

Grace Browne
Wired
3 Nov 2022

Excerpts:

In November 2021, when the psychedelics company Compass Pathways released the top-line results of its trial looking at psilocybin in patients with treatment-resistant depression, the stock of the company plunged almost 30 percent. The dive was reportedly prompted by the somewhat-middling results of the research—but also because of the scattering of serious adverse events that occurred during the trial.

Amid the psychedelic renaissance, bringing up their potential harms has been somewhat of a taboo. The field, vilified for decades, has only just recently reentered the mainstream, after all. But as clinical trials get bigger—and the drugs are increasingly commercialized—more negative outcomes are likely to transpire. With the Compass trial results hinting at this, arguably now’s the time to open up the dialog about psychedelics’ potential adverse effects—even if it means tempering the hype that has built up.

At the same time, 179 of the 233 patients in the trial reported at least one adverse event, like headaches, nausea, fatigue, or insomnia—uncomfortable, sure, but not a huge cause for concern. But 12 patients experienced serious adverse events. These were defined as displays of suicidal ideation, including self-harm. Five of the patients in the highest-dose group were reported to have displayed suicidal behavior, as well as six in the 10 mg group. This was compared to just one in the placebo group.

“Is this expected in a trial like this? To some degree, yes,” says Natalie Gukasyan, assistant professor and medical director for the Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic & Consciousness Research. When you’re working with a patient group as vulnerable as those with treatment-resistant depression, higher rates of suicidal ideation are to be expected. But it’s worth noting, she says, that there were higher rates of these events in the higher-dose group, which brings up the question of whether the drug played a role. One thing she thinks would have been helpful to include in the study was the lifetime history of previous suicide attempts in the participants, which is an important predictor of future suicidal behavior.

 

[mindhealpro]

Interesting positions, and what do you think about organizations that promote harm reduction?

 

[Pissed_and_messed]

Someone on our dear forum verbalized it something like that; "When new entity is introduced to society, it is expected to be extra-safe, exceeding all standards by unreasonable margin"