October 17, 2024 • 38 mins
Massachusetts Ballot Question 4 ask voters whether to legalize certain natural psychedelics such as “magic mushrooms.” What’s your opinion on psychedelic substances? Dr. Nassir Ghaemi from the Coalition for Safe Communities, representing the “No” side of the issue joined us this evening to discuss Question 4!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's Night Side with Dan Ray WBZ Constance Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Well, we have been trying this fall to get some
conversation going on all of the ballot questions here in Massachusetts,
and there are five of them. We'd We talked last
night with the state auditor here in Massachusetts, Diana Desauglio,
who wants the specific authority and ballot question one to
(00:28):
audit the state legislature. We've talked about the potential elimination
of mcast as a high high school graduation requirement. We
have yet to talk about the unionization for transportation network drivers,
and we have talked about minimum wage for tipped workers.
We may get back to that, but tonight, for the
first time, we're going to talk about what's called the
(00:50):
limited legalization and regulation of certain natural psychedelic substances with us.
We are honored to be joined by doctor Nasir me.
He's a professor of psychiatry at the Toughts Medical School
and he knows a lot more about this than I do.
We will have someone on from the other side. I
(01:11):
believe the the the advocates for this situation, but we're
gonna We're gonna focus on with doctor Gami, why he
feels this is not something that should be approved in Massachusetts.
And so, first of all, doctor Gami, welcome tonight'side. Thank
you so much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
Hi Dan, thank you for having me.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
So, how give us a little bit of your background.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
You have a very impressive resume, both you know as
a as a psychiatrist and also as an author. You
the director of the mood Disorder Program and the psycho
Pharmacological Consultation Clinic at Toughts Medical Center and as I said,
at professor at Tufts University School of Medicine. You've done
(02:01):
clinical work and research on depression, manic depressive illness, particularly
in the in exploring the role of antidepressants in the
treatment of bipolar disorder. And you've published over one hundred
scientific articles and has written or edited eight books. So
you're you're a busy guy. Tell us what the subject
(02:22):
that he end is.
Speaker 4 (02:23):
You know, psychedelics.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Most of us of a certain age when you hear
the word psychedelic, you think, oh LSD or something. These
are psycho psychedelic mushrooms or psychic is it more than mushrooms?
But it's called psychedelic substances. What are we talking about?
Speaker 4 (02:39):
First?
Speaker 3 (02:39):
Of all right, so thank you for having me as
And let me just add the reason that I'm really
part of this debate is because I'm currently president of
the Massachusetts Psychiatric Society, which is the state branch of
(03:00):
the American Psychiatric Association, and we've come out formally opposed
to this ballot question, and so as the president of
the Society this year it's a one year service, I'm
sort of the spokesperson for us on it. Besides what
you said about my having this background in psychopharmacology meaning
(03:23):
medication research in psychiatry, and thirty years of clinical experience
treating psychiatric patients, especially with mood illnesses, depression, and bipolar illness.
I'll estimate I've probably treated over ten thousand people, and
I'm actively clinically treating people now too. But in addition
to those roles as a doctor and a researcher, the
(03:43):
reason I'm really talking these days is because I'm president
of the main psychiatric society. So what we're talking about.
Your question was, what are we talking about in terms
of mushrooms. Mushrooms is a kind of a generic phrase
to describe certain kinds of mushroom which come from a
(04:03):
family that produces this drug which is called psilocybin PSI
l o cybi n psilocybin, and that's actually the name
of the mushroom family. It's called psilocyb. And these are
culled psychedelics based on what got popularized in the nineteen
(04:25):
fifties by a British novelist, Alvis Huxley. But actually in
the scientific world the class has always been called hallucinogens,
which is the name implies they all cause hallucinations, that's
their main effect.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Yeah, And some of the ads that I have seen
on television, and i'd get to have someone on from
the other side, they have some folks who say that
they've used these and it helps them, and it's a
very I guess it's a sympathetic if someone can use
(05:01):
something and can help them, and I guess there's a
real potential to harm people.
Speaker 4 (05:06):
With this as well.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
Correct, Absolutely so. The reason you're saying these ads on
television only about the benefits or the pro side is
and we can talk about this more in a while,
is that they're highly funded by venture capitalists who have
spent so far at least five million dollars to get
this question on the ballot. If it wasn't for all
the money they've spent on it, we wouldn't be sitting
(05:29):
here talking about it. And of course they're not doing
that out of the goodness of their heart, even though
that's what they say, and the advocates will say they're
doing that because the majority of them also own investments
in psychedelic companies and stand to make billions of dollars
once people get used to using these or want to
use them.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
But the.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Question that you that you raised is, you know, why
are we what do we think about the fact that
people say that they benefit from it, And the fact
is maybe they are helpful, But the fact that someone
says they benefit them from something doesn't prove that they're helpful.
(06:13):
You know, for two thousand years in medicine, people had
leading with leeches and people thought that was helpful. And
we learned over time that you have to take people's
opinions and test them with scientific research. And specifically, we
do these studies where people get randomly assigned to two groups,
the treatment group or not, and that's the only way
(06:34):
you can really tell that treatment works. You have to
have a comparison group, and it has to be random.
Speaker 4 (06:38):
So that.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
I think most of our audience understands that they're taking
placebosh and usually.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
They get a placebo, which means a sugar pill. It's nothing.
And so until you do that, you can't tell that
the treatment makes people better, because a lot of times
people get better because of that placebo effect, because they're
really happy to take something or they believe in it,
and that's definitely a major factor here. So you want
to control for that, you want to correct for it,
and until we do that, we won't really know that
(07:07):
these things are effective. And there is some research along
those lines, some of which suggests some benefit and some
of which doesn't, which we can talk about.
Speaker 4 (07:14):
Okay, we're going to take a quick break.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
My guest is doctor Nassier Gami. As I mentioned, he
is a professor of psychiatry at a tough medical school,
a really impressive resume, and is dealing with has dealt
with these issues. I will admit this is something that
I'm not particularly familiar with, but I remember how marijuana
(07:38):
became legalized in this state several years ago, and the
initial impact, the initial suggestion was that people, some people
would have a medical benefit, and it's just going to
become available for people who needed medical treatment that included marijuana,
and now we have marijuana sold literally through the state.
(08:01):
So I wonder, and I'm going to ask doctor Gami
if that's what one of his concerns is and how
widespread this would be and how many people, once this
stuff is out and about would say, well, I think
I'm going to try that and could it could some
harm be done? So we got a lot to talk about.
If you know or if you have an opinion on this,
(08:22):
you're more than welcome. If you have a question, you're
more than welcome. It's one of the ballot questions, Question four.
A vote, a yes vote would make it legal, and
we'll explain exactly what what legalization means. And no vote
would say no, it's not going to be legal. We'll
get to all of that. The number six, one, seven, two, five,
four to ten thirty six one seven, nine, three, one,
(08:43):
ten thirty. We'll get to calls as soon as we can.
We'll fill up those lines and we'll get going back
on night Side.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
Run after this.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World
night Side Studios. I'm DOWNBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
We're talking about the legalization of psychedelic here in Massachusetts.
My guest is doctor Nasser Gami, who is a professor
doctor of Psychiatry at the Toughts Medical School, University of
Toughs University Medical School. This is question number four from
all of the polls that I have seen. This is
(09:20):
probably at this point the closest poll of the five questions. Again,
I think this is one that could go either way.
Which is more important for us to all pay attention
to it and this I just want to read this
a little bit of the summary. The proposed law would
allow persons age twenty one and older to grow, possess,
(09:42):
and use certain natural psychedelic substances in certain circumstances. The
psychedelic substances allowed would be two substances found in mushrooms,
psilocybin and citizen, and three substances found in plants. I
can't even well mescaline is one of them. The other
(10:02):
two icon pronounced. These substances could be purchased at an
approved location for use under the supervision of a license facilitator.
That's interesting. What does that mean, doctor? We're not talking
about marijuana. Where you go in and you purchase your
marijuana and you take it home, right, you got There
(10:22):
are going to be people who are licensed facilitators, so
you're able to purchase this at an approved location for
use under the supervision of a license facilitator.
Speaker 4 (10:34):
I'm a lawyer.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
I'm reading that and I'm seeing that word for use
under the supervision.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
Tell us what that means.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
Yeah, So it's very misileating if you don't have it explained.
So there's two aspects of the bill. The first is
basically unregulated legalization. People can grow and distribute these five
hallucinogens drugs and cost hallucinations which I prefer the psychedelics
is a more sific name these five pollucinages. They can
grow them in their spare bedroom twelve feet by twelve
(11:06):
feet area or in a backyard, and they can distribute
them to their friends and family and no one can
stop them from doing so. They can't sell them, but
they can do anything short of that. In fact, in Colorado,
where there has been passed, there's a so called gray
market where these are being sold even though they're not
supposed to. And we can talk about how obviously people
under age twenty one are going to get them. Teenagers
(11:28):
and college students. But that's half the bill is letting
people basically have all the hallucinogens they want in a
twelve foot by twelve foot area that it's not a
small amount. And in fact, one of them, mescaline has
eighteen gram is how much you're allowed to have, which
is thirty times more than the average dose. So these
(11:50):
are not small amounts of some of these agents. At least,
the other half of the bill sounds like it's more reasonable,
like you have licensed facilitators in so call therapy centers.
Them is these are going to be high school graduates
who take a three month online course and then charge
you one thousand dollars a session in these so called
therapy centers. They are not medical doctors or medical professionals,
(12:11):
and they are not mental health professionals because the way
the law is written, it says that we cannot require
that these people be medical professionals or mental health professionals,
which means you have to let them be non professionals.
And the fact is the medical professionals, the doctors, and
the mental health professionals are not going to sign up
(12:32):
to be so called licensed facilitators because these substances are
illegal federally, and we cannot legally prescribe them even if
the state passes this law. So it's going to be
given by high school graduates who are not going to
be sufficiently educated to figure out who should get these
things and who shouldn't, nor can they handle the psychotic
states of severe delusions and hallucinations which people call bad
(12:55):
trips that are going to happen with these substances or
the medical applications. One of the five, which is called
iba gain, actually has cardiac arrhythmias on the as its effect,
and it can it causes cardiac arrests or heart attacks
as a known side effect. And these people are not
going to be doctors who will know how to handle
any of this.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Yeah, that is one of the three substances listed, iyebill gain.
I'm again, you didn't even want to try to pronounce
the first one, din thy trip to mine or something.
Speaker 3 (13:25):
Dimeso or you can just call a d MT, which
is the active ingredient in this plant called ayahuasca, which
almost killed one of my patients, which I can tell
you about it if you like it.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Yo, that's some Let's grab a couple of phone phone
calls here, we're going to keep going here. We've got
some full lines. The only lines that are available is
six one seven nine. I don't want Donna to have
to hang on so long. Donna, you called early your
thoughts on this and say hello to my guest here tonight.
Speaker 4 (13:58):
With us, Dr.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
Hi Hi, and thank you for inviting me back.
Speaker 6 (14:06):
Dan.
Speaker 5 (14:07):
So, yeah, So I know that Eliza Dushku was there
was a Boston magazine article about her experience with this,
and I know that hers was a positive one. She's
from Watertown, by the way, which is where I'm from, Waham, Assachusetts.
So my question is, I know that other people have
taken them. You know, people I know personally have described
(14:31):
their experiences, some good, some you know, maybe they were
scared by. And then you hear, you know, the the
possible legalization aspect, which I thought was going to give
the opportunity to tell how to fine tune the dosages,
(14:51):
et cetera. So, doctor Nasa, with regard to what you
just said, it almost sounds like.
Speaker 4 (14:59):
There's this.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
Ambiguity about what is actually going to happen if question
four happens.
Speaker 3 (15:09):
Yeah, I would say it's more than ambiguity. The question
is really written in a way to exclude the medical community.
But we were never consulted about this question.
Speaker 6 (15:18):
You know.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
We found out about it, you know, just a few
months ago. And the attitude of a lot of the
advocates is anti medical establishment. They say, the doctors aren't
helping us, so let's all just get our hallucinogens on
our own and use them ourselves. And then again, these
therapy centers, they set it up so that it's not
going to be legal for any medical professional to participate,
(15:40):
and it's going to be given by high school level
graduates or college graduates, but not people with psychiatrical medical expertise.
And let me just say, in terms of the positive experiences,
you know, as doctors, we see the negative experiences. We
see a lot of patients who do badly, and they're
not going out and talking about how badly they're doing
(16:01):
in the media. And you know, they're not the people
that the advocates will bring out because when you suffer,
and you suffer tragically, usually you want to protect your
privacy and your confidentiality. But we as the doctor see
this a lot, so we're sort of speaking. I'm speaking
(16:21):
for my patients who do badly with the sollucinogens, and
I have many experiences with that, So yes, there are
positive experiences, that's what you usually hear about, but there
are many negative experiences, and because of privacy and confidentiality,
you tend not to hear about that as much. And
that's why, you know, we doctors are starting to talk
about it a little more so that the public gets
(16:42):
a full appreciation of the risks and the harms here
and not just the possible benefits.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Donna, it sounds to me this, Dan Ray Donna, sounds
to me like you're much kind of an advocate for
this for legalization, am I reading you correctly?
Speaker 5 (16:58):
Me personally, I can't do most drugs because I have
weird autoimmune type issues that make it so that you
can't even tell what would happen to me if I
just took a sleeping pill and I was up for days.
So I know people who could bafit from this. Now,
having worked in a pharmacy at fifteen years old, I
(17:19):
saw how a lot of people suffered with the mental
illness aspect. You know, people on those you know drugs
where they feel like zombies, et cetera. And what I
read in the article that was written in Boston Magazine.
Was essentially that she got this benefit that she wasn't
able to get using any of the other avenues, including
(17:42):
her own self medication aspects. So the one thing I
liked about the article is that it appeared to be
I don't It didn't seem like she was doing it
on a regular basis. It almost like a one and done,
like a reset. Maybe, Doctor Nassa, is that what can
happen is.
Speaker 6 (18:00):
A reset order?
Speaker 3 (18:02):
Yeah, it's possibly. When you hear about benefits, it's often
with PTSD post traumatic stress disorder. And what usually people
say is that they take one dose or two doses
and then they get psychotherapy with it, and they get
a whole lot more benefit than they got with other
medications or therapies. And it's true that the medications that
we have are pretty limited in their benefit with PTSD.
(18:24):
But it's also true that the psychedelics have not been proven,
have not been studied compared to the treatments that we
have to prove that they're better. They may be, they're
just not proven. The one thing that's been studied is
MDMA ecstasy, and it was better than placebo in a
study that was we got a lot of attention a
few months ago because it went to the FDA, but
(18:45):
that's not one of the five substances that's going to
be in this bill, so even if that works, that
won't be helping people. And the FDA actually rejected it
because of ethical problems where the psychedelic advocates who did
the study were being even actually inappropriate with the patients
at least one person. And also there was some data
(19:05):
problems where some patients said that they did worse, but
in the study they were claimed to have responded. So
I think the jury is out on whether these things
work for PTSD. But that's the one place where people
have talked about it the most. I just want to add.
The other place is depression, and there it's been studied
more and some studies find that there's some benefit, but
(19:28):
they always see and to be the same as our
current antidepressants, which are much safer. So in depression at least,
it's not the case that these drugs are a whole
lot better than what we have. And you know, the
claim that's made that this will solve the mental health
crisis is not supported by that science and is really
more like science fiction. Fantasy in my opinion.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
All right, doctor, thank you, Donna. I've got a news
break at the bottom of the hour here which I
have to take. I appreciate you calling in, and we'll
be dealing with this subject again next week.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
I think it's Tuesday.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Night, but I'll have to get you more information and
maybe you can join us Tuesday night as well.
Speaker 5 (20:04):
Okay, I appreciate it.
Speaker 7 (20:07):
Take care of me, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
We'll take quick news break, be back with my guest,
doctor Nassir Gomi. He is a psychiatrist. He is a
professor of psychiatry at Tufts Medical School, a great medical school,
and we're talking about the legalization of psychedelics here in Massachusetts,
(20:29):
as the ballot question reflects. Doctor Gami likes to refer
to them as the as hallucinations, so I'll use both
of those terms interchangeably. We'll be back on Nightside with
more comments and questions and information on ballot question number four.
Here on Nightside.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
You're on Nightside with Dan Ray on w b Z
Boston's news radio.
Speaker 4 (20:53):
Thank you, Nicole.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
We're talking about question number four in the Massachusetts ballot
this year. It deals with the potential legalization of psychedelics
as the language that is used.
Speaker 4 (21:07):
In the question.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
My guest, doctor Nasaagami, refers them to more likes to
use the phrase as a hallucigens. You know, when you
think back to the nineteen sixties and things like that.
It's a very close. According to the polls, this is
one of those that's going to be probably the closest
of all the questions on the ballot, at least that's
(21:29):
what the Poles say. Let's see what the questions are
as we continue with my guest, who again is a doctor,
a professor at the Tough Medical School. He is a
professor of psychiatry. There, let me go next to Steven Cambridge.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
Steve, you were.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Next time Nightside. Thanks for calling in, doctor Gami. This
is one of my best callers.
Speaker 8 (21:50):
Dan says that he sets me up. Thank you, Dan,
You're very kind.
Speaker 4 (21:56):
What I believe, by the way, go right ahead.
Speaker 8 (21:58):
They were hallucinogens known as hallucinogens to a psychiatrist in
Canada named Humphrey Osmond, who is the man who introduced
them to Aldis Suxley coined the term psychedelic, right okay,
and I have two points. I guess I would say
one is you really would never be able to do
(22:21):
a randomized test with these because it certainly wouldn't be
a blind test because this subject would immediately know he
was given, So you couldn't really do a good randomized
test with these.
Speaker 3 (22:34):
Yeah, that's a good point, and I think that's one
of the problems that so those of us we are
concerned about these agents feel is that the studies overestimate
the benefit because people can tell you have visual hallucinations
and distortions, and you hear voices, you can tell you're
on this, and the placebo obviously doesn't do that. So
when you don't when you can tell, then that always
(22:55):
overestimates the benefit of the thing you're studying. So the
real effects are lower than what people say in these studies.
There is one analysis of a study where they tried
to an analysis where they tried to correct for this
by using the placebo effect for antidepressant trials and using
that in the in the as a comparison in the
(23:18):
hallucinogen trials. And when you do that, the supposed benefits
of the flucinogens decreases a lot.
Speaker 8 (23:26):
They have been studying these drugs for about sixty years.
I mean, since Timothy Leary and Richard Albert got national
attention in this matter. Of course, the studies have been
kind of sideline studies. But if they really had benefits,
wouldn't we know about them by now?
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Yeah? I mean I think we would to some extent.
The fact is that they, you know, went underground for
a while, the advocates will say, and they weren't studied
as much. But at least we know a lot about
their harms from those sixty years. And one of the
researchers was a big advocate for psychedelics at Johns Hopkins.
(24:06):
Doctor Matthew Johnson has wroten this long substance abuse review
that a lot of people cite in support of the hallucinogens.
But even there, he says that with sixty years of evidence,
we can confirm that these drugs are prone to abuse
and that they should be controlled. The only question is
how much control they should have. But we shouldn't fool
(24:26):
ourselves to think that they're just completely safe, non addictive,
and have no risk of abuse at all.
Speaker 8 (24:32):
Doctor I was around in the sixties to hear Timothy
Leary and Albert and other people advocate for them, and
I don't know. I don't think I've ever met anybody
who I really thought benefited from taking them, and I
have met people who, certainly, if they took too many
of them, really men never recovered entirely.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Yeah, you know, I agree with you. You know, there's
research on now intensive use has increased in the last
decade or two. When you look at there's a nationwide
study about ten percent of the country has tried hallucinogens,
and in those people, there's a fivefold higher rate of
heroin abuse, and seventy percent of those folks have tried heroin,
(25:18):
fifty percent have tried cocaine and opiates. In other words,
the people that use these solucinogens are not just people
who take a little bit and then don't do anything else.
They tend to abuse other drugs. And that's why, you know,
some people say they're not addictive, and they're wrong, I think,
based on that kind of evidence. And they also mistake
the question of not having physical withdrawal symptoms as a
(25:40):
meaning you can't have addiction. But cocaine doesn't have physical
withdrawal symptoms, but it's highly addictive. And then people say,
well it's natural. Well, opium is natural, but it's highly addictive.
So these are drugs. They can be abused and are
abused by some people. And if we legalize it to
the whole population, it won't be just ten percent, it
will be thirty forty percent of the population using it,
(26:03):
and we'll see that a good chunk of them will
abuse it and become addicted to it, and it will
harm them.
Speaker 8 (26:07):
What do you think with Michael Poland's advocacy in this regard,
You know, I think that.
Speaker 3 (26:15):
I haven't followed it super carefully, to be honest, but
I think that the claim that there's something super special
about these hallucinogens that's going to change the world is
a religion. It's not science, in my opinion. And when
you look at the research, even all the research we've
talked about is just short term benefit. You take the
drug for a few weeks and you feel better. There's
(26:37):
nothing that shows that in a year or longer, you've
treated an underlying disease and you've cured somebody of anything.
This is just I feel terrible now. This makes me
feel better, you know. In some ways, that's like taking steroids,
you know, which work for various psych medical conditions. Per
short term, but they don't solve anything long term, and
(26:58):
that could be different for pths. I'm open to someone
doing the research for a year and showing me that
if you took some of these agents for PTSD at
one a year, they were a whole lot better than placebo.
But no one's ever done that study, and no one's
even just planning to do that study now. So I
think it's way too premature to say let's grow this
in all of our spare bedrooms now based on what
(27:19):
we know.
Speaker 4 (27:20):
Now, Well, thank you ask a very quick question. I
can jump INFC just a one question.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
You mentioned that that there's a few states with this
stuff is actually currently legal.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
Correct, Yes, they're legal in Oregon and in Colorado last year. Basically,
the same political action committee and the same venture capital
millionaires who own investments in the biotech companies have paid
for these other states for their ballot questions and for
(27:51):
the advertising, and they're trying to buy the votes of
the people of Massachusetts.
Speaker 4 (27:55):
Now, is there much statistically available?
Speaker 2 (28:01):
I don't know if how long these have been available
or legalized in those two states. They talks that is
there anything?
Speaker 3 (28:11):
What the advocates often will say is, oh, we haven't
heard any bad problems from those two states. Well, the
reason is that in Oregon they've set it up that
they're not going to report any data until twenty twenty five,
so we basically Colorado is even later than Oregon. So
we basically have no official data from either state, and
that's why you're not hearing much. But we do have research,
(28:31):
you know, studies done on solutionogens all over the country
and other states, you know, that show things like fifty
percent increase in emergency room visits and people on hallucinogens
in California, which is a double the rate that you
see with alcohol and with other substances you see in Massachusetts.
We've well in the country, there's another study which showed
(28:52):
that ten percent of people that use hallucinogens at all
drive with on them, and one third of people who
use them regularly drive on So these are the kinds
of things that put the public health at risk with
car accidents and further overcrowding of our emergency rooms and hospitals.
Speaker 8 (29:07):
All right, thank you for a very interesting discussion.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
You never disappoint me, Steve. Thank you very much, great questions,
great questions.
Speaker 4 (29:15):
Thank you to night. Good night.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
We're going to take a break, be back with a
final segment. Doctor Now's here Gomi of Tough Medical School.
I just think it's an interesting subject. We probably do
a lot more of this between November fifth, because information
needs to get out. Back on Night's side, we're going
to try to get John, Rachel and Manny all in
between now and ten o'clock.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
Be right back.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Now, back to Dan ray Line from the Window World
Night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (29:43):
Okay, back we go, Folks are going to ask you
to formulate a question and try to be as concise
as possible because we're limited in time here and I
want to basically maximize the information we can get from
doctor Gomi.
Speaker 4 (29:58):
Let me go to Rachel.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Rachel joins us from Quincy, Massachusetts. Rachel, welcome, your next
go right ahead.
Speaker 6 (30:04):
Rachel, Hey, Dan, thank you. So I keep hearing if
you take the psychedelics in this conversation, Oh, it makes
you feel better, It makes you feel better. But when
you have somebody that's a psychosis, that's already hallucinating, and
(30:26):
I know for a fact you can get this stuff,
you know, online whatever, and they've been told that it's
going to make you feel better. How is that going
to make you feel better if you're already hallucinating?
Speaker 3 (30:42):
Yes, good point, Absolutely not these There are many people
have bipolar illness, schizophrenia, or some versions of depression where
they can have psychosis naturally, but also they may not
have it naturally, but they're susceptible to it, And when
they get these solutions gens, they get a whole lot worse.
They get more psychotic, more delusions, hallucinations, they have mania,
(31:05):
or they have more severe depression. Let me give you
an example of a patient, one of my patients. She
was in her early twenties. She got ayahuasca, which has
the DMT that's one of the substances in the bill.
She had a mild depression when she took it, and
she developed a very severe, worse depression with a full
blown psychotic state, delusions, hallucinations. She was hospitalized for six months,
(31:28):
got catatonic, which means she couldn't eat, drink, sleep, or move,
and she had to get a feeding tube. She almost died,
and eventually, with electroshock treatments, which are obviously very serious treatments,
she gradually got better. This is one of my patients,
so that's an example of how someone with psychiatric illnesses,
with mental illnesses can get worse on these medications. And
(31:50):
it's funny because the advocates called for mental health options,
but they're really ignoring people with mental illnesses.
Speaker 6 (31:58):
Right then trying to thank you, I know, I just
want to add something. So what's happening is in whatever
I do know somebody that bought something online and they
started acting a lot different, but they think that it
was you know, houpingly depression. But then they acted odd
(32:22):
and almost high. And how do you take that away
from them and say, no, it's not helping you.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
This is why we're going to have a bunch of
psychiatric crises and emergency rooms filling up our hospitals and
making it hard for people to get prompt medical care.
That's another way it harms the public. But again, even
these people, that's people with these conditions I described, it's
five percent at least of the population. That's hundreds of
thousands of people in the state that are going to
be at high risk of being harmed by if these
(32:52):
things are legalized.
Speaker 4 (32:54):
Great questions.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
Rachel, I got three other callers and want to try
to get to thank you, so much, great job.
Speaker 4 (32:58):
Thanks job, good night. Let me go to Manny and Glouston.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Man, you gotta be quick for me, go right ahead.
Speaker 7 (33:04):
Hi, thanks uh. I was calling about the strain that
they call it. Like back in the I'm one of
the old guys. In the seventies they sprayed Mexico with
tarva quatt and a lot of us jumped off the
bustin and then they started growing it and Patrick Ditches
(33:27):
called hydriponn it. Now, in the old days, the magic
mushrooms were done from Kyle chips, uh so whatever out
in the field. What are they made out of nowadays?
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Yeah, that's a good question. I don't really know, to
be honest.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Fair enough, fair enough, Thanks Manny, good question, appreciate it.
Let's keep rolling. You're going to go to John and Brainfick.
Speaker 9 (33:52):
John, Hi, Doc, Captain Heinsteight. How are you, folks. I'll
try to make it quick. Two things. Number One, it
seems like you guys came onto the scene late. I
was wondering if you could. And that's my first question.
Do you know why you guys came onto this late
and didn't know about this? And the second question I
have is.
Speaker 4 (34:14):
That John, John, what I sound like earlier.
Speaker 9 (34:18):
You said you didn't even know this was on the
ballot or something.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Right, you know this is true.
Speaker 9 (34:21):
A few months ago, the medical profession seems absent from
the whole thing, and now they're trying to catch up.
Am I right or wrong about that?
Speaker 3 (34:29):
It's totally true. So I became president of the Master's
Psychicatidy in May, and that's when we first announced that
that we were opposed to it, and the Massachusetts Medical
Society agreed with us around then and they also reposed it.
They represent twenty five thousand physicians, the majority in the state.
By the way, the Masters of SAP State Troopers Association
just recently came out finally opposed to it because of
(34:52):
the high car accident risk. So you know what happens
is that these these advocates, these political action committees that
they have have been active for a decade. They gave
you medical marijuana and recreational marijuana. Now they're moving on
to hallucinogens. After this, they'll probably want recreational hallucinogens even
more broadly. So they've been organized for over a decade.
(35:13):
This is all they do. But we medical societies, well,
we're just doctors. We're treating patients. We're all volunteers. We
don't make get any money for any of this work,
and so we just react when things happen. And we
didn't know until a few months ago, and the fact
that we're all volunteers is important. I think the.
Speaker 9 (35:30):
Other point I wanted to make was that they were
on YouTube, I watching an how Along show about some
very credible people, actresses, singers, talking about their experiences with them.
Do you have any plans to counter something like that
with an owl worth of all the nightmas that it happened,
because I think those are the type things that could.
(35:52):
And by the way, I want to thank you because
I knew there was something up with this bill that
I didn't want to vote for, but you guys made
it clear. It's basically going to be a free for all.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
And uh, first of all, great great perspective. Thank you
very much for pointing that out. I got to tell
you the fact that the group would come on with
a bunch of actors or actresses or singers or sword
swallowers or clowns or whatever I'm going with the doctors.
Speaker 3 (36:15):
To be honest, I gotta tell you, we don't have
any of that because we don't have you know, the
mass like society doesn't have any money to spend on
any of this. We're all just dues paying members and
everything's volunteer. I mean, I think with there there's a
larger group that's a coalition that's opposed to the question,
that did not have any fundraising until recently, but I
think they've raised a little bit now and you might
(36:36):
see a commercial or two coming out soon.
Speaker 9 (36:38):
Well, thank you again, and John, thank you. Just get
the message out. It's a free for all now.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Captain Hindsight stop buy more often. It was a good call.
Thank you very much. To the callers in the line,
I apologize, but we're flat out of time. Uh.
Speaker 4 (36:51):
Doctor Gamy, Uh, you've.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
Been an extraordinary guest and you've helped me prep for
next week. And when we hit the other side on
we may invite you back at some point.
Speaker 3 (37:05):
Yeah, Dan, can I say one more thing before you
go out? Right ahead, you're going to hear about decriminalization,
and we support that, but you don't have to legalize
it for everybody in the state to grow it in
their spare bedroom, to not have laws that treated as
a crime, So that that's really not necessary either, And
I hope people get the message that there are a
lot of harms here and very limited benefits and it's
(37:27):
much better handled in the medical system with doctors prescribing
it with careful supervision. And that's not what this ballot
question is about. It harms the public health. It's actually
about private wealth and recreational use. And that's why the
majority of physicians oppose it.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Private wealth over a private wealth over a public health.
That's an interesting that could be a bumper strip doctor.
Speaker 4 (37:52):
We'll have you back. You were extraordinary. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (37:55):
Thank you very much.
Speaker 4 (37:56):
You're very welcome.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
We get back when we talk about the successes but
the Israeli Army, the IDF has had in the last
few weeks with Jeff Robbins, I believe this these successes
might might pave the way for peace in the Middle East.
Speaker 4 (38:13):
We'll discuss it right after the ten o'clock news
It's Night Side with Dan Ray WBZ Constance Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Well, we have been trying this fall to get some
conversation going on all of the ballot questions here in Massachusetts,
and there are five of them. We'd We talked last
night with the state auditor here in Massachusetts, Diana Desauglio,
who wants the specific authority and ballot question one to
(00:28):
audit the state legislature. We've talked about the potential elimination
of mcast as a high high school graduation requirement. We
have yet to talk about the unionization for transportation network drivers,
and we have talked about minimum wage for tipped workers.
We may get back to that, but tonight, for the
first time, we're going to talk about what's called the
(00:50):
limited legalization and regulation of certain natural psychedelic substances with us.
We are honored to be joined by doctor Nasir me.
He's a professor of psychiatry at the Toughts Medical School
and he knows a lot more about this than I do.
We will have someone on from the other side. I
(01:11):
believe the the the advocates for this situation, but we're
gonna We're gonna focus on with doctor Gami, why he
feels this is not something that should be approved in Massachusetts.
And so, first of all, doctor Gami, welcome tonight'side. Thank
you so much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (01:30):
Hi Dan, thank you for having me.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
So, how give us a little bit of your background.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
You have a very impressive resume, both you know as
a as a psychiatrist and also as an author. You
the director of the mood Disorder Program and the psycho
Pharmacological Consultation Clinic at Toughts Medical Center and as I said,
at professor at Tufts University School of Medicine. You've done
(02:01):
clinical work and research on depression, manic depressive illness, particularly
in the in exploring the role of antidepressants in the
treatment of bipolar disorder. And you've published over one hundred
scientific articles and has written or edited eight books. So
you're you're a busy guy. Tell us what the subject
(02:22):
that he end is.
Speaker 4 (02:23):
You know, psychedelics.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Most of us of a certain age when you hear
the word psychedelic, you think, oh LSD or something. These
are psycho psychedelic mushrooms or psychic is it more than mushrooms?
But it's called psychedelic substances. What are we talking about?
Speaker 4 (02:39):
First?
Speaker 3 (02:39):
Of all right, so thank you for having me as
And let me just add the reason that I'm really
part of this debate is because I'm currently president of
the Massachusetts Psychiatric Society, which is the state branch of
(03:00):
the American Psychiatric Association, and we've come out formally opposed
to this ballot question, and so as the president of
the Society this year it's a one year service, I'm
sort of the spokesperson for us on it. Besides what
you said about my having this background in psychopharmacology meaning
(03:23):
medication research in psychiatry, and thirty years of clinical experience
treating psychiatric patients, especially with mood illnesses, depression, and bipolar illness.
I'll estimate I've probably treated over ten thousand people, and
I'm actively clinically treating people now too. But in addition
to those roles as a doctor and a researcher, the
(03:43):
reason I'm really talking these days is because I'm president
of the main psychiatric society. So what we're talking about.
Your question was, what are we talking about in terms
of mushrooms. Mushrooms is a kind of a generic phrase
to describe certain kinds of mushroom which come from a
(04:03):
family that produces this drug which is called psilocybin PSI
l o cybi n psilocybin, and that's actually the name
of the mushroom family. It's called psilocyb. And these are
culled psychedelics based on what got popularized in the nineteen
(04:25):
fifties by a British novelist, Alvis Huxley. But actually in
the scientific world the class has always been called hallucinogens,
which is the name implies they all cause hallucinations, that's
their main effect.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Yeah, And some of the ads that I have seen
on television, and i'd get to have someone on from
the other side, they have some folks who say that
they've used these and it helps them, and it's a
very I guess it's a sympathetic if someone can use
(05:01):
something and can help them, and I guess there's a
real potential to harm people.
Speaker 4 (05:06):
With this as well.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
Correct, Absolutely so. The reason you're saying these ads on
television only about the benefits or the pro side is
and we can talk about this more in a while,
is that they're highly funded by venture capitalists who have
spent so far at least five million dollars to get
this question on the ballot. If it wasn't for all
the money they've spent on it, we wouldn't be sitting
(05:29):
here talking about it. And of course they're not doing
that out of the goodness of their heart, even though
that's what they say, and the advocates will say they're
doing that because the majority of them also own investments
in psychedelic companies and stand to make billions of dollars
once people get used to using these or want to
use them.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
But the.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Question that you that you raised is, you know, why
are we what do we think about the fact that
people say that they benefit from it, And the fact
is maybe they are helpful, But the fact that someone
says they benefit them from something doesn't prove that they're helpful.
(06:13):
You know, for two thousand years in medicine, people had
leading with leeches and people thought that was helpful. And
we learned over time that you have to take people's
opinions and test them with scientific research. And specifically, we
do these studies where people get randomly assigned to two groups,
the treatment group or not, and that's the only way
(06:34):
you can really tell that treatment works. You have to
have a comparison group, and it has to be random.
Speaker 4 (06:38):
So that.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
I think most of our audience understands that they're taking
placebosh and usually.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
They get a placebo, which means a sugar pill. It's nothing.
And so until you do that, you can't tell that
the treatment makes people better, because a lot of times
people get better because of that placebo effect, because they're
really happy to take something or they believe in it,
and that's definitely a major factor here. So you want
to control for that, you want to correct for it,
and until we do that, we won't really know that
(07:07):
these things are effective. And there is some research along
those lines, some of which suggests some benefit and some
of which doesn't, which we can talk about.
Speaker 4 (07:14):
Okay, we're going to take a quick break.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
My guest is doctor Nassier Gami. As I mentioned, he
is a professor of psychiatry at a tough medical school,
a really impressive resume, and is dealing with has dealt
with these issues. I will admit this is something that
I'm not particularly familiar with, but I remember how marijuana
(07:38):
became legalized in this state several years ago, and the
initial impact, the initial suggestion was that people, some people
would have a medical benefit, and it's just going to
become available for people who needed medical treatment that included marijuana,
and now we have marijuana sold literally through the state.
(08:01):
So I wonder, and I'm going to ask doctor Gami
if that's what one of his concerns is and how
widespread this would be and how many people, once this
stuff is out and about would say, well, I think
I'm going to try that and could it could some
harm be done? So we got a lot to talk about.
If you know or if you have an opinion on this,
(08:22):
you're more than welcome. If you have a question, you're
more than welcome. It's one of the ballot questions, Question four.
A vote, a yes vote would make it legal, and
we'll explain exactly what what legalization means. And no vote
would say no, it's not going to be legal. We'll
get to all of that. The number six, one, seven, two, five,
four to ten thirty six one seven, nine, three, one,
(08:43):
ten thirty. We'll get to calls as soon as we can.
We'll fill up those lines and we'll get going back
on night Side.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
Run after this.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World
night Side Studios. I'm DOWNBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
We're talking about the legalization of psychedelic here in Massachusetts.
My guest is doctor Nasser Gami, who is a professor
doctor of Psychiatry at the Toughts Medical School, University of
Toughs University Medical School. This is question number four from
all of the polls that I have seen. This is
(09:20):
probably at this point the closest poll of the five questions. Again,
I think this is one that could go either way.
Which is more important for us to all pay attention
to it and this I just want to read this
a little bit of the summary. The proposed law would
allow persons age twenty one and older to grow, possess,
(09:42):
and use certain natural psychedelic substances in certain circumstances. The
psychedelic substances allowed would be two substances found in mushrooms,
psilocybin and citizen, and three substances found in plants. I
can't even well mescaline is one of them. The other
(10:02):
two icon pronounced. These substances could be purchased at an
approved location for use under the supervision of a license facilitator.
That's interesting. What does that mean, doctor? We're not talking
about marijuana. Where you go in and you purchase your
marijuana and you take it home, right, you got There
(10:22):
are going to be people who are licensed facilitators, so
you're able to purchase this at an approved location for
use under the supervision of a license facilitator.
Speaker 4 (10:34):
I'm a lawyer.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
I'm reading that and I'm seeing that word for use
under the supervision.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
Tell us what that means.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
Yeah, So it's very misileating if you don't have it explained.
So there's two aspects of the bill. The first is
basically unregulated legalization. People can grow and distribute these five
hallucinogens drugs and cost hallucinations which I prefer the psychedelics
is a more sific name these five pollucinages. They can
grow them in their spare bedroom twelve feet by twelve
(11:06):
feet area or in a backyard, and they can distribute
them to their friends and family and no one can
stop them from doing so. They can't sell them, but
they can do anything short of that. In fact, in Colorado,
where there has been passed, there's a so called gray
market where these are being sold even though they're not
supposed to. And we can talk about how obviously people
under age twenty one are going to get them. Teenagers
(11:28):
and college students. But that's half the bill is letting
people basically have all the hallucinogens they want in a
twelve foot by twelve foot area that it's not a
small amount. And in fact, one of them, mescaline has
eighteen gram is how much you're allowed to have, which
is thirty times more than the average dose. So these
(11:50):
are not small amounts of some of these agents. At least,
the other half of the bill sounds like it's more reasonable,
like you have licensed facilitators in so call therapy centers.
Them is these are going to be high school graduates
who take a three month online course and then charge
you one thousand dollars a session in these so called
therapy centers. They are not medical doctors or medical professionals,
(12:11):
and they are not mental health professionals because the way
the law is written, it says that we cannot require
that these people be medical professionals or mental health professionals,
which means you have to let them be non professionals.
And the fact is the medical professionals, the doctors, and
the mental health professionals are not going to sign up
(12:32):
to be so called licensed facilitators because these substances are
illegal federally, and we cannot legally prescribe them even if
the state passes this law. So it's going to be
given by high school graduates who are not going to
be sufficiently educated to figure out who should get these
things and who shouldn't, nor can they handle the psychotic
states of severe delusions and hallucinations which people call bad
(12:55):
trips that are going to happen with these substances or
the medical applications. One of the five, which is called
iba gain, actually has cardiac arrhythmias on the as its effect,
and it can it causes cardiac arrests or heart attacks
as a known side effect. And these people are not
going to be doctors who will know how to handle
any of this.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Yeah, that is one of the three substances listed, iyebill gain.
I'm again, you didn't even want to try to pronounce
the first one, din thy trip to mine or something.
Speaker 3 (13:25):
Dimeso or you can just call a d MT, which
is the active ingredient in this plant called ayahuasca, which
almost killed one of my patients, which I can tell
you about it if you like it.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Yo, that's some Let's grab a couple of phone phone
calls here, we're going to keep going here. We've got
some full lines. The only lines that are available is
six one seven nine. I don't want Donna to have
to hang on so long. Donna, you called early your
thoughts on this and say hello to my guest here tonight.
Speaker 4 (13:58):
With us, Dr.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
Hi Hi, and thank you for inviting me back.
Speaker 6 (14:06):
Dan.
Speaker 5 (14:07):
So, yeah, So I know that Eliza Dushku was there
was a Boston magazine article about her experience with this,
and I know that hers was a positive one. She's
from Watertown, by the way, which is where I'm from, Waham, Assachusetts.
So my question is, I know that other people have
taken them. You know, people I know personally have described
(14:31):
their experiences, some good, some you know, maybe they were
scared by. And then you hear, you know, the the
possible legalization aspect, which I thought was going to give
the opportunity to tell how to fine tune the dosages,
(14:51):
et cetera. So, doctor Nasa, with regard to what you
just said, it almost sounds like.
Speaker 4 (14:59):
There's this.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
Ambiguity about what is actually going to happen if question
four happens.
Speaker 3 (15:09):
Yeah, I would say it's more than ambiguity. The question
is really written in a way to exclude the medical community.
But we were never consulted about this question.
Speaker 6 (15:18):
You know.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
We found out about it, you know, just a few
months ago. And the attitude of a lot of the
advocates is anti medical establishment. They say, the doctors aren't
helping us, so let's all just get our hallucinogens on
our own and use them ourselves. And then again, these
therapy centers, they set it up so that it's not
going to be legal for any medical professional to participate,
(15:40):
and it's going to be given by high school level
graduates or college graduates, but not people with psychiatrical medical expertise.
And let me just say, in terms of the positive experiences,
you know, as doctors, we see the negative experiences. We
see a lot of patients who do badly, and they're
not going out and talking about how badly they're doing
(16:01):
in the media. And you know, they're not the people
that the advocates will bring out because when you suffer,
and you suffer tragically, usually you want to protect your
privacy and your confidentiality. But we as the doctor see
this a lot, so we're sort of speaking. I'm speaking
(16:21):
for my patients who do badly with the sollucinogens, and
I have many experiences with that, So yes, there are
positive experiences, that's what you usually hear about, but there
are many negative experiences, and because of privacy and confidentiality,
you tend not to hear about that as much. And
that's why, you know, we doctors are starting to talk
about it a little more so that the public gets
(16:42):
a full appreciation of the risks and the harms here
and not just the possible benefits.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Donna, it sounds to me this, Dan Ray Donna, sounds
to me like you're much kind of an advocate for
this for legalization, am I reading you correctly?
Speaker 5 (16:58):
Me personally, I can't do most drugs because I have
weird autoimmune type issues that make it so that you
can't even tell what would happen to me if I
just took a sleeping pill and I was up for days.
So I know people who could bafit from this. Now,
having worked in a pharmacy at fifteen years old, I
(17:19):
saw how a lot of people suffered with the mental
illness aspect. You know, people on those you know drugs
where they feel like zombies, et cetera. And what I
read in the article that was written in Boston Magazine.
Was essentially that she got this benefit that she wasn't
able to get using any of the other avenues, including
(17:42):
her own self medication aspects. So the one thing I
liked about the article is that it appeared to be
I don't It didn't seem like she was doing it
on a regular basis. It almost like a one and done,
like a reset. Maybe, Doctor Nassa, is that what can
happen is.
Speaker 6 (18:00):
A reset order?
Speaker 3 (18:02):
Yeah, it's possibly. When you hear about benefits, it's often
with PTSD post traumatic stress disorder. And what usually people
say is that they take one dose or two doses
and then they get psychotherapy with it, and they get
a whole lot more benefit than they got with other
medications or therapies. And it's true that the medications that
we have are pretty limited in their benefit with PTSD.
(18:24):
But it's also true that the psychedelics have not been proven,
have not been studied compared to the treatments that we
have to prove that they're better. They may be, they're
just not proven. The one thing that's been studied is
MDMA ecstasy, and it was better than placebo in a
study that was we got a lot of attention a
few months ago because it went to the FDA, but
(18:45):
that's not one of the five substances that's going to
be in this bill, so even if that works, that
won't be helping people. And the FDA actually rejected it
because of ethical problems where the psychedelic advocates who did
the study were being even actually inappropriate with the patients
at least one person. And also there was some data
(19:05):
problems where some patients said that they did worse, but
in the study they were claimed to have responded. So
I think the jury is out on whether these things
work for PTSD. But that's the one place where people
have talked about it the most. I just want to add.
The other place is depression, and there it's been studied
more and some studies find that there's some benefit, but
(19:28):
they always see and to be the same as our
current antidepressants, which are much safer. So in depression at least,
it's not the case that these drugs are a whole
lot better than what we have. And you know, the
claim that's made that this will solve the mental health
crisis is not supported by that science and is really
more like science fiction. Fantasy in my opinion.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
All right, doctor, thank you, Donna. I've got a news
break at the bottom of the hour here which I
have to take. I appreciate you calling in, and we'll
be dealing with this subject again next week.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
I think it's Tuesday.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Night, but I'll have to get you more information and
maybe you can join us Tuesday night as well.
Speaker 5 (20:04):
Okay, I appreciate it.
Speaker 7 (20:07):
Take care of me, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
We'll take quick news break, be back with my guest,
doctor Nassir Gomi. He is a psychiatrist. He is a
professor of psychiatry at Tufts Medical School, a great medical school,
and we're talking about the legalization of psychedelics here in Massachusetts,
(20:29):
as the ballot question reflects. Doctor Gami likes to refer
to them as the as hallucinations, so I'll use both
of those terms interchangeably. We'll be back on Nightside with
more comments and questions and information on ballot question number four.
Here on Nightside.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
You're on Nightside with Dan Ray on w b Z
Boston's news radio.
Speaker 4 (20:53):
Thank you, Nicole.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
We're talking about question number four in the Massachusetts ballot
this year. It deals with the potential legalization of psychedelics
as the language that is used.
Speaker 4 (21:07):
In the question.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
My guest, doctor Nasaagami, refers them to more likes to
use the phrase as a hallucigens. You know, when you
think back to the nineteen sixties and things like that.
It's a very close. According to the polls, this is
one of those that's going to be probably the closest
of all the questions on the ballot, at least that's
(21:29):
what the Poles say. Let's see what the questions are
as we continue with my guest, who again is a doctor,
a professor at the Tough Medical School. He is a
professor of psychiatry. There, let me go next to Steven Cambridge.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
Steve, you were.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Next time Nightside. Thanks for calling in, doctor Gami. This
is one of my best callers.
Speaker 8 (21:50):
Dan says that he sets me up. Thank you, Dan,
You're very kind.
Speaker 4 (21:56):
What I believe, by the way, go right ahead.
Speaker 8 (21:58):
They were hallucinogens known as hallucinogens to a psychiatrist in
Canada named Humphrey Osmond, who is the man who introduced
them to Aldis Suxley coined the term psychedelic, right okay,
and I have two points. I guess I would say
one is you really would never be able to do
(22:21):
a randomized test with these because it certainly wouldn't be
a blind test because this subject would immediately know he
was given, So you couldn't really do a good randomized
test with these.
Speaker 3 (22:34):
Yeah, that's a good point, and I think that's one
of the problems that so those of us we are
concerned about these agents feel is that the studies overestimate
the benefit because people can tell you have visual hallucinations
and distortions, and you hear voices, you can tell you're
on this, and the placebo obviously doesn't do that. So
when you don't when you can tell, then that always
(22:55):
overestimates the benefit of the thing you're studying. So the
real effects are lower than what people say in these studies.
There is one analysis of a study where they tried
to an analysis where they tried to correct for this
by using the placebo effect for antidepressant trials and using
that in the in the as a comparison in the
(23:18):
hallucinogen trials. And when you do that, the supposed benefits
of the flucinogens decreases a lot.
Speaker 8 (23:26):
They have been studying these drugs for about sixty years.
I mean, since Timothy Leary and Richard Albert got national
attention in this matter. Of course, the studies have been
kind of sideline studies. But if they really had benefits,
wouldn't we know about them by now?
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Yeah? I mean I think we would to some extent.
The fact is that they, you know, went underground for
a while, the advocates will say, and they weren't studied
as much. But at least we know a lot about
their harms from those sixty years. And one of the
researchers was a big advocate for psychedelics at Johns Hopkins.
(24:06):
Doctor Matthew Johnson has wroten this long substance abuse review
that a lot of people cite in support of the hallucinogens.
But even there, he says that with sixty years of evidence,
we can confirm that these drugs are prone to abuse
and that they should be controlled. The only question is
how much control they should have. But we shouldn't fool
(24:26):
ourselves to think that they're just completely safe, non addictive,
and have no risk of abuse at all.
Speaker 8 (24:32):
Doctor I was around in the sixties to hear Timothy
Leary and Albert and other people advocate for them, and
I don't know. I don't think I've ever met anybody
who I really thought benefited from taking them, and I
have met people who, certainly, if they took too many
of them, really men never recovered entirely.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Yeah, you know, I agree with you. You know, there's
research on now intensive use has increased in the last
decade or two. When you look at there's a nationwide
study about ten percent of the country has tried hallucinogens,
and in those people, there's a fivefold higher rate of
heroin abuse, and seventy percent of those folks have tried heroin,
(25:18):
fifty percent have tried cocaine and opiates. In other words,
the people that use these solucinogens are not just people
who take a little bit and then don't do anything else.
They tend to abuse other drugs. And that's why, you know,
some people say they're not addictive, and they're wrong, I think,
based on that kind of evidence. And they also mistake
the question of not having physical withdrawal symptoms as a
(25:40):
meaning you can't have addiction. But cocaine doesn't have physical
withdrawal symptoms, but it's highly addictive. And then people say,
well it's natural. Well, opium is natural, but it's highly addictive.
So these are drugs. They can be abused and are
abused by some people. And if we legalize it to
the whole population, it won't be just ten percent, it
will be thirty forty percent of the population using it,
(26:03):
and we'll see that a good chunk of them will
abuse it and become addicted to it, and it will
harm them.
Speaker 8 (26:07):
What do you think with Michael Poland's advocacy in this regard,
You know, I think that.
Speaker 3 (26:15):
I haven't followed it super carefully, to be honest, but
I think that the claim that there's something super special
about these hallucinogens that's going to change the world is
a religion. It's not science, in my opinion. And when
you look at the research, even all the research we've
talked about is just short term benefit. You take the
drug for a few weeks and you feel better. There's
(26:37):
nothing that shows that in a year or longer, you've
treated an underlying disease and you've cured somebody of anything.
This is just I feel terrible now. This makes me
feel better, you know. In some ways, that's like taking steroids,
you know, which work for various psych medical conditions. Per
short term, but they don't solve anything long term, and
(26:58):
that could be different for pths. I'm open to someone
doing the research for a year and showing me that
if you took some of these agents for PTSD at
one a year, they were a whole lot better than placebo.
But no one's ever done that study, and no one's
even just planning to do that study now. So I
think it's way too premature to say let's grow this
in all of our spare bedrooms now based on what
(27:19):
we know.
Speaker 4 (27:20):
Now, Well, thank you ask a very quick question. I
can jump INFC just a one question.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
You mentioned that that there's a few states with this
stuff is actually currently legal.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
Correct, Yes, they're legal in Oregon and in Colorado last year. Basically,
the same political action committee and the same venture capital
millionaires who own investments in the biotech companies have paid
for these other states for their ballot questions and for
(27:51):
the advertising, and they're trying to buy the votes of
the people of Massachusetts.
Speaker 4 (27:55):
Now, is there much statistically available?
Speaker 2 (28:01):
I don't know if how long these have been available
or legalized in those two states. They talks that is
there anything?
Speaker 3 (28:11):
What the advocates often will say is, oh, we haven't
heard any bad problems from those two states. Well, the
reason is that in Oregon they've set it up that
they're not going to report any data until twenty twenty five,
so we basically Colorado is even later than Oregon. So
we basically have no official data from either state, and
that's why you're not hearing much. But we do have research,
(28:31):
you know, studies done on solutionogens all over the country
and other states, you know, that show things like fifty
percent increase in emergency room visits and people on hallucinogens
in California, which is a double the rate that you
see with alcohol and with other substances you see in Massachusetts.
We've well in the country, there's another study which showed
(28:52):
that ten percent of people that use hallucinogens at all
drive with on them, and one third of people who
use them regularly drive on So these are the kinds
of things that put the public health at risk with
car accidents and further overcrowding of our emergency rooms and hospitals.
Speaker 8 (29:07):
All right, thank you for a very interesting discussion.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
You never disappoint me, Steve. Thank you very much, great questions,
great questions.
Speaker 4 (29:15):
Thank you to night. Good night.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
We're going to take a break, be back with a
final segment. Doctor Now's here Gomi of Tough Medical School.
I just think it's an interesting subject. We probably do
a lot more of this between November fifth, because information
needs to get out. Back on Night's side, we're going
to try to get John, Rachel and Manny all in
between now and ten o'clock.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
Be right back.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Now, back to Dan ray Line from the Window World
Night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2 (29:43):
Okay, back we go, Folks are going to ask you
to formulate a question and try to be as concise
as possible because we're limited in time here and I
want to basically maximize the information we can get from
doctor Gomi.
Speaker 4 (29:58):
Let me go to Rachel.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Rachel joins us from Quincy, Massachusetts. Rachel, welcome, your next
go right ahead.
Speaker 6 (30:04):
Rachel, Hey, Dan, thank you. So I keep hearing if
you take the psychedelics in this conversation, Oh, it makes
you feel better, It makes you feel better. But when
you have somebody that's a psychosis, that's already hallucinating, and
(30:26):
I know for a fact you can get this stuff,
you know, online whatever, and they've been told that it's
going to make you feel better. How is that going
to make you feel better if you're already hallucinating?
Speaker 3 (30:42):
Yes, good point, Absolutely not these There are many people
have bipolar illness, schizophrenia, or some versions of depression where
they can have psychosis naturally, but also they may not
have it naturally, but they're susceptible to it, And when
they get these solutions gens, they get a whole lot worse.
They get more psychotic, more delusions, hallucinations, they have mania,
(31:05):
or they have more severe depression. Let me give you
an example of a patient, one of my patients. She
was in her early twenties. She got ayahuasca, which has
the DMT that's one of the substances in the bill.
She had a mild depression when she took it, and
she developed a very severe, worse depression with a full
blown psychotic state, delusions, hallucinations. She was hospitalized for six months,
(31:28):
got catatonic, which means she couldn't eat, drink, sleep, or move,
and she had to get a feeding tube. She almost died,
and eventually, with electroshock treatments, which are obviously very serious treatments,
she gradually got better. This is one of my patients,
so that's an example of how someone with psychiatric illnesses,
with mental illnesses can get worse on these medications. And
(31:50):
it's funny because the advocates called for mental health options,
but they're really ignoring people with mental illnesses.
Speaker 6 (31:58):
Right then trying to thank you, I know, I just
want to add something. So what's happening is in whatever
I do know somebody that bought something online and they
started acting a lot different, but they think that it
was you know, houpingly depression. But then they acted odd
(32:22):
and almost high. And how do you take that away
from them and say, no, it's not helping you.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
This is why we're going to have a bunch of
psychiatric crises and emergency rooms filling up our hospitals and
making it hard for people to get prompt medical care.
That's another way it harms the public. But again, even
these people, that's people with these conditions I described, it's
five percent at least of the population. That's hundreds of
thousands of people in the state that are going to
be at high risk of being harmed by if these
(32:52):
things are legalized.
Speaker 4 (32:54):
Great questions.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
Rachel, I got three other callers and want to try
to get to thank you, so much, great job.
Speaker 4 (32:58):
Thanks job, good night. Let me go to Manny and Glouston.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Man, you gotta be quick for me, go right ahead.
Speaker 7 (33:04):
Hi, thanks uh. I was calling about the strain that
they call it. Like back in the I'm one of
the old guys. In the seventies they sprayed Mexico with
tarva quatt and a lot of us jumped off the
bustin and then they started growing it and Patrick Ditches
(33:27):
called hydriponn it. Now, in the old days, the magic
mushrooms were done from Kyle chips, uh so whatever out
in the field. What are they made out of nowadays?
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Yeah, that's a good question. I don't really know, to
be honest.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Fair enough, fair enough, Thanks Manny, good question, appreciate it.
Let's keep rolling. You're going to go to John and Brainfick.
Speaker 9 (33:52):
John, Hi, Doc, Captain Heinsteight. How are you, folks. I'll
try to make it quick. Two things. Number One, it
seems like you guys came onto the scene late. I
was wondering if you could. And that's my first question.
Do you know why you guys came onto this late
and didn't know about this? And the second question I
have is.
Speaker 4 (34:14):
That John, John, what I sound like earlier.
Speaker 9 (34:18):
You said you didn't even know this was on the
ballot or something.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Right, you know this is true.
Speaker 9 (34:21):
A few months ago, the medical profession seems absent from
the whole thing, and now they're trying to catch up.
Am I right or wrong about that?
Speaker 3 (34:29):
It's totally true. So I became president of the Master's
Psychicatidy in May, and that's when we first announced that
that we were opposed to it, and the Massachusetts Medical
Society agreed with us around then and they also reposed it.
They represent twenty five thousand physicians, the majority in the state.
By the way, the Masters of SAP State Troopers Association
just recently came out finally opposed to it because of
(34:52):
the high car accident risk. So you know what happens
is that these these advocates, these political action committees that
they have have been active for a decade. They gave
you medical marijuana and recreational marijuana. Now they're moving on
to hallucinogens. After this, they'll probably want recreational hallucinogens even
more broadly. So they've been organized for over a decade.
(35:13):
This is all they do. But we medical societies, well,
we're just doctors. We're treating patients. We're all volunteers. We
don't make get any money for any of this work,
and so we just react when things happen. And we
didn't know until a few months ago, and the fact
that we're all volunteers is important. I think the.
Speaker 9 (35:30):
Other point I wanted to make was that they were
on YouTube, I watching an how Along show about some
very credible people, actresses, singers, talking about their experiences with them.
Do you have any plans to counter something like that
with an owl worth of all the nightmas that it happened,
because I think those are the type things that could.
(35:52):
And by the way, I want to thank you because
I knew there was something up with this bill that
I didn't want to vote for, but you guys made
it clear. It's basically going to be a free for all.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
And uh, first of all, great great perspective. Thank you
very much for pointing that out. I got to tell
you the fact that the group would come on with
a bunch of actors or actresses or singers or sword
swallowers or clowns or whatever I'm going with the doctors.
Speaker 3 (36:15):
To be honest, I gotta tell you, we don't have
any of that because we don't have you know, the
mass like society doesn't have any money to spend on
any of this. We're all just dues paying members and
everything's volunteer. I mean, I think with there there's a
larger group that's a coalition that's opposed to the question,
that did not have any fundraising until recently, but I
think they've raised a little bit now and you might
(36:36):
see a commercial or two coming out soon.
Speaker 9 (36:38):
Well, thank you again, and John, thank you. Just get
the message out. It's a free for all now.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Captain Hindsight stop buy more often. It was a good call.
Thank you very much. To the callers in the line,
I apologize, but we're flat out of time. Uh.
Speaker 4 (36:51):
Doctor Gamy, Uh, you've.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
Been an extraordinary guest and you've helped me prep for
next week. And when we hit the other side on
we may invite you back at some point.
Speaker 3 (37:05):
Yeah, Dan, can I say one more thing before you
go out? Right ahead, you're going to hear about decriminalization,
and we support that, but you don't have to legalize
it for everybody in the state to grow it in
their spare bedroom, to not have laws that treated as
a crime, So that that's really not necessary either, And
I hope people get the message that there are a
lot of harms here and very limited benefits and it's
(37:27):
much better handled in the medical system with doctors prescribing
it with careful supervision. And that's not what this ballot
question is about. It harms the public health. It's actually
about private wealth and recreational use. And that's why the
majority of physicians oppose it.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Private wealth over a private wealth over a public health.
That's an interesting that could be a bumper strip doctor.
Speaker 4 (37:52):
We'll have you back. You were extraordinary. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (37:55):
Thank you very much.
Speaker 4 (37:56):
You're very welcome.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
We get back when we talk about the successes but
the Israeli Army, the IDF has had in the last
few weeks with Jeff Robbins, I believe this these successes
might might pave the way for peace in the Middle East.
Speaker 4 (38:13):
We'll discuss it right after the ten o'clock news
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