Psychedelic drugs like MDMA and mushrooms ‘as safe as playing football’

Using psychedelic drugs is a safe as riding a bike or playing a game of football, the heads of a drugs research organisation have claimed.

Legal argument aside for a moment: Judging by this horror-show Sunday League compilation video, we’d be forced to agree.

Teri Krebs and Pål-Ørjan Johansen argue in the Lancet Psychiatry journal that bans on substances like MDMA and magic mushrooms are “inconsistent with human rights” and that psychedelic drugs are much less harmful to society and individual users compared to alcohol and tobacco, for example.

In a letter published in the journal, the pair say:

“Based on extensive human experience, it is generally acknowledged that psychedelics do not elicit addiction or compulsive use and that there is little evidence for an association between psychedelic use and birth defects, chromosome damage, lasting mental illness, or toxic effects to the brain or other organs.

"Psychedelics often produce profound experiences while at the same time having a safety risk profile comparable to many activities of daily life, such as riding a bike or playing soccer."

Which is fancy academic-speak for “play on, psychonauts...”

It’s not just a pair of kooky brain-doctors that think this way, too: Last month, Virgin boss Richard Branson and deputy prime minister Nick Clegg argued that the War on Drugs had been lost and that the UK should start to decriminalise drugs.

H/t: Lancet Psychiatry journal