- Penicillin was the world’s first Miracle Drug. It revolutionized treatment of bacterial infections and is credited with saving 200 million lives.
- Psychedelics are the new Miracle Drugs, in the process of revolutionizing the treatment of mental health conditions that afflict over 1 billion people.
Psychedelic drugs are seen by increasing numbers of medical professionals as our best (only?) hope to address the Mental Health Crisis, which already afflicts over 1 billion people (roughly 1 in 6 people around the world).
Psychedelic drug R&D is also rapidly branching out into some of the other largest/most important fields of medical treatment, for example: chronic pain, autoimmune disorders and traumatic brain injury (TBI).
Enormous populations in need of treatment. Enormous treatment markets.
The world’s first Miracle Drug
Are psychedelic drugs the “miracle drugs” of the 21st century? Perhaps the best way to answer that question is to point out the close parallel between psychedelics and penicillin – the world’s first Miracle Drug.
In 1940, Howard Florey’s newly created drug cured four infected mice—and changed the course of medical history. Penicillin, the world’s first antibiotic, has since saved an estimated 200 million lives.
As recently as the beginning of World War II, our healthcare system lacked any effective means to combat ordinary bacterial infections.
The medical profession did the best it could to treat the symptoms from these infections, but could do little to directly address the source of the problem – the bacteria. Penicillin (and other antibiotics) offered physicians the first effective cure for bacterial infections.
Since then, penicillin alone is credited for saving 200 million lives. Put another way, since first going into mass production in 1944, penicillin has saved more lives each year (on average) then the total number of global deaths from the coronavirus pandemic.
Truly a Miracle Drug.
The desperate need for new Miracle Drugs
Flash forward to the year 2021. Today, the world is badly in need of a new “miracle”.
The problem? Ordinary stress. But in the 21st century, with increasingly dysfunctional governments, economies and societies, our lives are saturated with stress.
As just one example, burnout in the workplace is already at “epidemic” levels – and increasing exponentially.
Workplace Burnout at ‘Epidemic Proportions’
Too much work. Too little pay. Too many technological advancements. Too much emphasis on recruiting new employees rather than keeping existing ones happy.
Too much work. Too little pay. Too many technological advancements. Too much emphasis on recruiting new employees rather than keeping existing ones happy.
The consequence of lives that are saturated with stress is an explosion in stress-related mental health disorders like depression, anxiety, addiction and PTSD – the Mental Health Crisis.
Our governments and the media continue to obsess about COVID-19. But for every person in total who has contracted COVID (including those already cured), there are ten people currently suffering from mental health disorders like depression, anxiety, addiction and PTSD.
This is the real “crisis” upon which our governments – and the medical profession – should be focused. The great irony is that the oppressive lockdowns imposed by our governments have caused a further explosion in mental health disorders, while producing only modest/dubious results in controlling COVID.
The Mental Health Crisis of today is a far worse “crisis” than the (old) problem of bacterial infections, which penicillin and other antibiotics effectively addressed. Yet our healthcare system has little more success in treating mental health disorders today than it did in treating bacterial infections prior to antibiotics.
- Because of the dismal treatment options, twothirds of Americans exhibiting clinical symptoms of depression don’t even seek treatment
- Twothirds of U.S. veterans receiving PTSD therapy from the Department of Veterans Affairs report no benefit from their therapy
- “Addiction therapy” is simply a revolving door – rehab, release, relapse, repeat – because the medical profession lacks any effective drugs to control addictive cravings
Totally inadequate.
Psychedelic drugs: the next Miracle Drugs?
Enter psychedelic drugs.
Psychedelic Stock Watch has previously presented the evidence that psychedelic drugs may, in fact, be the new Miracle Drugs of the 21st century.
- Life-changing results (i.e. effective cures)
- Dozens of clinical trials (already completed or in progress) that provide objective proof of the medicinal benefits of these drugs
- A dramatic improvement from the existing standard of care
Prior to the discovery of penicillin, bacterial infections could (and did) often result in death or the amputation of gangrenous limbs. Clearly, penicillin produced life-changing results.
Today, mental health disorders are at epidemic proportions. Mental illness is the leading cause of disability. Our healthcare system presently offers no cures for these conditions and only mediocre success in treating the symptoms.
In the many clinical studies on psychedelic drugs, the vast majority of patients being tested reported improvements in their condition. Even better, many studies report that after only a few sessions of psychedelics-assisted therapy (sometimes only one) that patients “cease to exhibit symptoms” – i.e. they are effectively cured.
One clinical study after another is showing that psychedelic drugs are generating life-changing results for patients, representing an enormous leap forward versus the existing standard of care.
Miracle Drugs?
Picture yourself as one of the 1+ billion people grappling with a serious mental health disorder that disrupts your life – if not being literally disabling.
You have tried existing treatment options and gotten little to no relief.
Maybe you have only had this medical issue for a matter of months. Very possibly, you have been suffering from the disorder for years or even decades.
Now you hear about a new therapy based around new drugs (actually old drugs that were previously prohibited). Based on the treatment statistics, you know there is a very good chance that these new drugs will improve your condition – and they may very well cure it.
What would you call that?
A “miracle”.
This drug miracle may not be limited to stress-related mental health disorders.
A multi-purpose miracle?
It’s only in recent years that medical science has focused more closely on head injuries – and greatly improved diagnostics.
The result is that “traumatic brain injury” (TBI) has emerged as a new health crisis. U.S. numbers alone are sobering.
TBI in the United States
- An estimated 2.8 million people sustain a TBI annually.1 Of them:
- 50,000 die,
- 282,000 are hospitalized, and
- 2.5 million, nearly 90%, are treated and released from an emergency department.
- TBI is a contributing factor to a third (30%) of all injury-related deaths in the United States.1
- Every day, 153 people in the United States die from injuries that include TBI.1
- Most TBIs that occur each year are mild, commonly called concussions.2
- Direct medical costs and indirect costs of TBI, such as lost productivity, totaled an estimated $60 billion in the United States in 2000.3
This is a ~$120 billion treatment market, estimated to reach $182 billion by 2027. In an upcoming article, Psychedelic Stock Watch will examine the growing convictions that psychedelic drugs also represent our best hope as a treatment for TBI.
Today, psychedelic drugs appear to be our new Miracle Drugs – as the world searches for a solution to the enormous Mental Health Crisis.
But this may only be the first “miracle” that psychedelic drug-based therapies are able to achieve.
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[1]Taylor CA, Bell JM, Breiding MJ, Xu L. Traumatic Brain Injury–Related Emergency Department Visits, Hospitalizations, and Deaths — United States, 2007 and 2013. MMWR Surveill Summ 2017;66(No. SS-9):1–16. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.ss6609a1
[2]Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. Report to Congress on mild traumatic brain injury in the United States: steps to prevent a serious public health problem. Atlanta (GA): Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; 2003.
[3]Coronado VG, Haileyesus T, Cheng TA, Bell JM, Haarbauer-Krupa J, Lionbarger MR, Flores-Herrera J, McGuire LC, Gilchrist J. Trends in sports- and recreation-related traumatic brain injuries treated in US emergency departments: The National Electronic Injury Surveillance System-All Injury Program (NEISS-AIP) 2001-2012. J Head Trauma Rehabil 2015; 30 (3): 185–197.