Psychedelic drugs and medicine

Are psychedelic drugs good for you? This is an odd question that carries such controversy that it is very embarrasing to ask. However, new studies on the potencial benefits in the use of hallucinogenic drugs to treat mental diseases will change people´s opinion. Several researches have shown some good results in the use of these psycho-active substances to treat diseases such as obsessive compulsive disorder(OCD) and addictions like alcoholism and other drugs. At the Orenda Institute in Baltimore, USA, scientists are examining LSD as a possible treatment for addiction to heroin, opium,alcohol, and sedatives. Other scientists are focusing their psychedelic research on learning more about the human brain, discovering antidotes to drug overdose, and relieving pain in cancer patients. It seems strange to use a drug to cure the addiction to another drug, but it seems to work.
Psychedelic drugs are called like this because they alter the mind of the user; they can alter perception and the sense of time and space. They produce hallucinations; that is, they make people see and hear things that don´t exist or bring into life to inaminate objects.
These drugs were part of the Hippie culture that raised in the 60`s and they were used for them as a way to connect with the nature and the universe, and other human beings as well. We can percieve their influence in the Hippie fashion and music(the use of bright colours and strange noises that represented the psychedelic experience). One of the pioneers of the use of these kind of drugs in the field of medicine was the psychiatrist Timothy Leary, who carried out researchers on the use of halluginogenics drugs to change and improve human behaviour. At that time, psychedelic drugs were legal and the scientist were allowed to work with them to do researches. However, by the end of the 60´s there had been such abuse of them that they were banned and still remain nowadays as illegal drugs. These days, the researchers must apply to the DEA(Drug Enforcement Administration) to receive approval to use these drugs.
Researches have proved the potential benefits of psychedelic drugs to treat mental illnesses: people who suffer from severe OCD experimented a significant relieve of the symptoms after taking a low dose of Psilocybin. Patients with depression improved their condition due to the administration of Ketamine. However, deep researches should be carried out because some patients who took these drugs suffered from side effects(such as flashback of the psychedelic experience). We have to take into account that the use of these drugs should be done under medical supervision due to the unwanted side effects that they can produce, and further studies should be conducted to know more about them.