Veterans Campaign to Legalize Psychedelics
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Two years ago, since Oregon, Washington, D.C., along with six other municipalities decriminalized psilocybin, veterans have quickly become the leading psychedelic legalization as medicine advocates that they praise with helping alleviate the anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress (PTSD), which are often linked to their military experiences.
There has been an epidemic of suicides amongst veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq, including the mass incarceration due to drug charges that have weakened public opinions on prohibition.
Since September 11, over 30,000 service members have committed suicide, four times the number of people who died on the battlefield.
Veterans Campaign to Legalize Psychedelics
Unfortunately, the Department of Veterans Affairs has had difficulties addressing the crisis with the conventional therapies of pharmacological involvements.
Post withdrawal from Afghanistan by the United States might have ended America’s “forever war.”
Although, the psychological effects from the past twenty years of military conflict reverberate amongst many of the nearly two million people fighting overseas.
The average wait time for modern treatments is 850 people.
Recent studies have supported anecdotal evidence of benefits and helped prove the therapeutic significance of psychedelics such as psilocybin, MDMA, LSD, psilocybin and MDMA.
A study published in Nature Medicine discovered that MDMA therapy alongside counselling exhibited substantial ease to patients with severe PTSD.
Psilocybin Therapy Study
A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed the psilocybin therapy potentials for treating severe depression, medical-resistant depression, major depression disorder (MDD), anxiety disorders, and addiction disorders.
A military veteran, Kevin Matthews, started and was responsible for leading a 2019 ballot measure in Denver that decriminalized psilocybin mushrooms.
It is credited as the first United States city to do so, as stated by personal statements about psychedelic therapy having been essential in winning over the skeptics concerned that decriminalization will lead to a massive increase in recreational use.
Over the last few years, decriminalization advocates have made remarkable progress.
Seattle was the most recent city encompassing the decriminalization of psilocybin and other plant-based psychoactive substances. Various other cities across the United States and Canada are on track to do the same.
However, as entheogens have gained approval amongst mental health professionals, even passionate supporters of decriminalization recognize the possible dangers of doing so without professional guidance and sufficient regulation.
Overdoses are a very rare occurrence, and psychedelics are not addictive.
Nevertheless, professionals advise the importance of supervised psychedelic trips given anecdotal reports about adverse reactions amongst those with disorders like schizophrenia and bipolar.
Psychedelic Movement Lead by Veterans
Veterans may seem like unlikely supporters for mind-altering, illegal drugs that many associates with the 1960s counterculture revolution and its stigma.
Although veterans have become influential representatives for entheogens across the spectrum of politics.
Scientists are still looking at and trying to better understand the psychedelic-assisted therapy mechanisms.
However, they are generally believed to encourage physiological altercations in the brain, as little as one session.
Psychedelics can provide a better perspective on complex trauma, giving users new approaches to process pain well finding inner peace.
