Salem, Massachusetts, will no longer arrest people for psilocybin

Salem, a town notorious for its 17th-century witch trials, is making a new name for itself by ending the modern-day witch hunt. As of this month, Salem is ending arrests over psilocybin mushrooms, Psychedelic Spotlight reports. It is now the sixth Massachusetts city to do so after the city council voted 9-0 in favor of the measure. Psilocybin is considered perhaps one of the safest drugs on the market. Findings published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology show that only 0.2% of magic mushroom users sought emergency medical care after using it. For those who had a bad experience, it was a negative psychological situation (a bad trip) that resolved itself within 24 hours. Furthermore, you cannot die from a physical psilocybin overdose. (By comparison, the World Health Organization reports that 3 million deaths annually are attributed to destructive alcohol use, accounting for 5.3% of all deaths.)

The Salem measure comes after the FDA classified psilocybin as a “breakthrough therapy” for depression. Salem-based neuroscientist Miyabe Shields said, “This is a win for science and the neurodivergent community to advance life-saving research into the complex inner workings of our brain,” reports Psychedelic Spotlight.

As too many people know (according to Columbia University, one in 10 Americans suffers from depression), standard treatments for depression, drugs like SSRIs and SNRIs, improve symptoms in only about 20 out of 100 people, data from the National Library of Medicine shows. Psychedelic options like psilocybin and ketamine are literal lifesavers for the many people who don’t respond to conventional medicine. While drugs like SSRIs take several weeks to take effect, psychedelics can relieve depression in a matter of hours. As reported by Psychedelic Spotlight, disabled Marine Corps veteran Michael Botelho, an active organizer of both the Bay Staters and New England Veterans for Plant Medicine who served in combat during the Gulf War, speaks of the measure: “Through the VA System I have She was prescribed over 160 medications, including opiates, to manage PTSD before she found psilocybin mushrooms. For the first time in almost 25 years, I’ve been able to sleep, beat opiate addiction, and go back to work.” Surely more New Englanders suffering from depression will feel comfortable using psychedelic treatments now that the risk of arrest is off the table.

Additionally, research shows that psilocybin plays an influential role in the harm reduction movement. A study of 44,000 Americans in the US Journal of Psychopharmacology found that psilocybin was associated with a 40% reduced risk of opioid addiction. Data from the CDC shows that opioids were involved in 68,630 overdose deaths in 2020 (74.8% of all drug overdose deaths). This powerful property of psilocybin gave the Salem measure a surprising proponent. You don’t have to turn off NWA’s “Fuck The Police,” but do know that Lucas Miller, the city’s chief of police, endorsed the measure before the city’s final vote. “The evidence that psilocybin may help with opiate addiction should not be ignored. We lose about 20 people to opioid overdoses in Salem every year,” says Miller, reports Psychedelic Spotlight.

Salem may be the sixth Massachusetts city to end arrests for psilocybin mushrooms, but it won’t be the last.

The Bay Staters for Natural Medicine grassroots group, which deserves credit for successfully executing the campaign that has taken years to build, has joined forces with Somerville, Cambridge, Northampton, Easthampton and Amherst to enact similar measures. Additionally, the organization is currently pushing for state legislation, including a Plant Medicines Act, that would legalize the domestic cultivation and transmission of psilocybin and related plants.