Some of the most striking early psychedelic research was done not with people with depression, but with people facing death. Cancer patients often experience anxiety and depression that conventional treatments do not fully relieve. Psilocybin-assisted therapy was studied as a way to help them find peace. The studies In the mid-2010s, two influential trials, one […]
Ketamine is an anesthetic that has been used in medicine since the 1960s. Over the past two decades it has become the first widely available fast-acting treatment for severe depression. It is also a drug with a history of misuse, which makes the story complicated. How it differs from standard antidepressants Conventional antidepressants such as […]
Psilocybin, the main psychoactive compound in “magic mushrooms,” is the leading candidate to become the first classic psychedelic medicine approved in the United States. This article walks through the evidence, from small academic studies to large Phase 3 programs. Early academic studies Researchers at Johns Hopkins and Imperial College London ran small trials in the […]
MDMA was once known mainly as a party drug. Over decades, researchers asked a different question: could its effects, which include reduced fear and increased trust, help people process trauma in psychotherapy? The largest trials say “possibly,” and the details matter. The problem being addressed PTSD can follow combat, assault, accidents, abuse, and other severe […]
Words shape how people treat each other, how policy is made, and whether someone feels safe enough to ask for help. In the overdose crisis, language can be a matter of life and death. This article explains why public-health bodies encourage person-first language, what it looks like, and what the limits of the idea are. […]
Naloxone is the single most widely available tool for reversing an opioid overdose. It is inexpensive, safe, and simple to use, and it has saved many lives. Even so, myths persist about it. This article separates fact from fiction. What naloxone does Naloxone is an opioid antagonist. It binds to the same receptors in the […]
Safer supply did not appear out of nowhere. It grew out of two decades of Canadian experiments in harm reduction, many of them launched in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside and some of them fought all the way to the Supreme Court. This timeline traces the main steps. 2003: Insite opens In 2003, Insite opened in Vancouver […]
To understand why safer supply and other harm-reduction measures exist, you have to start with the product on the street. Over the past decade, the unregulated drug supply in British Columbia and much of Canada became unpredictable and lethal. This article explains how, using the most recent official numbers. The scale of the crisis BC […]