Jim Smeeding, RPh, stops by Fortitude with his decades of Pharma experience to explain the fascinating and mysterious world of Psilocybin, aka, Mushrooms. The myths that scare us, the stories that entertain us, the positives that help us, the negatives that are pushed on us, the ever changing laws, the on-going research, the methods to sample, and being at the real Woodstock. Smeeding tells us everything you’ve always wanted to know about those little psychedelic fungi. Enjoy!
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roxo media house
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welcome back to fortitude everybody JW brinton Brinton how you been man
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captains baby cap Tech Studio thank you captix I think Mike Thomas You’re Gonna Love this episode how you been Buddy
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we’ve been good good well due to popular demand our our cannabis 101 episode went
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so it went so crazily well uh we had a lot of good feedback we brought another guy in here a little different topic but
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along the same lines uh in front of us today brinton is Jim smeeding uh this
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guy’s well pedigree Jim thank you for joining us absolutely if you don’t mind me I’ll read a couple of things so
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people get get a sense of who you are and who you were but you’re a former executive director of the National
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Association of specialty pharmacy founder of the center for Farmer Pharma
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pharmaco economic studies University of Texas College of Pharmacy uh your
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Pharmacy degree from the University of Buffalo and an NBA from UT we won’t hold that against you yeah I was going to say
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you you horned frog people right uh you know original original founder of the
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international Society of Pharma economics and outcomes research which has more than 15 000 members currently
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and you’ve worked in all major with all major pharmaceutical companies a founder and president of the indication biosciences at an early age stage drug
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Discovery company yep phenomenal and uh last couple things real quickly research
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as a founder of can of Pharma RX and member of the board of directors for Allied Health and VP of Pharma and chief
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scientific officer yep so to put it Molly Britain he’s been there and done that and he knows a few things about
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this world do you know anything about pharmacology by chance yeah of course I
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mean pharmacists in general have some training in that area and is uh JW’s already pointed out I have a kind of a
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broad scope of pharmaceutical pharmaceutical development use of
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pharmaceuticals I was the chief pharmacist for the City of Austin Texas so it’d be like over here in Fort Worth
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uh you know it did whether it be uh John Peter or uh or Texas Health Resources
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big house here so uh managed a lot of that developed my own orientation
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towards a pharmaceutical industry in the late 80s and then some of my companies we’ve basically worked for you could I
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always tell people start at Abbott and finish at Seneca I’ve done work for them so pretty much a to z and
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um successful entrepreneurial activities in a lot of different areas as JW mentioned I have my own drug development
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company right now which uses CBD with the lipid lowering agents Lipitor or
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Crestor we’re working that forward and on Allied Health which is a cannabis based company out of Kelowna British
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Columbia we have a strong pension towards treating patients that suffer
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from post-traumatic stress disorder PTSD and along with that anecdotally some of
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the people are using our cannabis products that you know psilocybin mushrooms would really help
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us get over the hump and we’re already taking it in terms of Natural Health orientation and availability and kind of
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the gray Market in Canada but again no big surprise which is the reason brinton Jim sits in front of us today today’s
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episode we’re going to learn about psilocybin otherwise known as mushrooms yes
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how many Dead shows you’ve been to ah golly I’ve probably at least uh probably
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six or seven I believe again when you get busy in life it’s hard to get on the
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train all the time and make all those shows but uh uh certainly uh
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um enjoyed my experiences I was talking a little bit before we got started here about going to Woodstock
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99. he saw Hendrix
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we’re talking in 1969. tell us that story that was it
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please you like that story so again it’s it’s interesting to me I I’ve talked uh
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on occasions about various things I’ve given actually lectures on cannabis when
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it was first coming into legalization recreational use what have you and it’s hilarious to me because I’ll tell this
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story so I gave a lecture to 600 people out in Las Vegas that were there for
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some kind of a money investor show and they asked me to talk about can abyss and I said well I’m going to talk about
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what the realities are in terms of legalization what have you so you know everybody in Nevada is getting real
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cranked up because they say hey not only we’re going to get medical but sooner or later it’s going to get legal here so
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there’s a lot of happy people in the audience going yeah and I can tell you if you haven’t been to Vegas recently I
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would say Vegas is certainly the major capital city of the Cannabis industry
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these days I mean it’s totally legal recreational and oh yeah yeah in fact uh I went out to the MJ Biz conference
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which is the largest conference around that last year and there were 26
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000 registrants and they filled up every single space that you can fill up in
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terms of exhibit hall at the Las Vegas Convention Center so it’s obviously a huge business in Vegas It’s Not Unusual
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to have stores it’ll do upwards of 15 million dollars worth of sales a year so
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so you get the idea but the reason I’ve related did that is because
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the fellow who is the moderator at the show she said well you know I’ve been to a a love fish the fish and you know so
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when I got up and you know I said if that’s your only credential yeah I went to Woodstock I took the green acid I
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went to my first date with my wife was to a Grateful Dead concert so clearly I’m the expert in the audience here so
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yeah you know yeah enjoy the rest of the ride so again um I enjoy uh Discovery I think I’ve got
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a lot of credibility within the pharmaceutical business itself I understand the regulatory side of things
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I understand the scientific side and I also understand the economics and I think that all kind of plays into
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psilocybin we’re going to talk about but hallucinogens in general and how this Market has really come alive and I
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related a little bit earlier I also deal with the payer community in health care and I think everybody knows when you go
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to get a prescription the big question is how much is this going to cost me that’s based on your benefit and the
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benefit is of course deliberated and approved by medical professionals within
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insurance companies so the whole idea of uh how do you get care how do I receive
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care what’s going to get paid for what is it going to be paid for it’s based on a lot of science the development of
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standards of care and all kinds of things that kind of fall into but is the patient really getting benefit from what
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we’re paying for so value value in health care they’re fairly significant again JW mentioned I’m the founder I
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founded the center for pharmacoeconomic studies the University of Texas in Austin and I’m the third president and
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one of the founders of the international Society of pharmacoeconomics and outcomes research what you find out is
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no matter where you are in this globe no matter what country no matter what political orientation everybody wants to
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know what’s the value the dollars we spent in health care it’s really a measurement of quality over cost and
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quality meaning Effectiveness over the cost of it so all relevant to new
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medicines old medicines natural medicines like psychedelics psilocybin
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and you know fun to talk about today sure let’s refine our scope for today’s discussion if you don’t mind psilocybin
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magic mushrooms is written very eloquently pointed out in probably grooming is in his you know college
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closet well I I actually did buy a psilocybin grow kit when I was at the University of Washington and uh back I
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guess about 40 years ago and I actually grew little mushrooms and you bought the spores and stuff it was kind of a an
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interesting kind of uh home planting yeah JW is familiar with it because he
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got the fungus in between his toes we’ve got medicine yeah I deserve that I
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deserve it right back at you my friend Jim yeah let’s start off simply what is psilocybin and why is it Rel why is it
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something that we know as mushrooms what’s what’s the story with that well again uh there’s a lot of functional
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mushrooms uh psychoactive mushrooms uh that are available uh some people for
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example find benefit from lots of different fungi uh lion’s mane cordycep
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Etc saying there are you know in the Pacific Northwest there are like you
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know whole food orientations whatever you can go in and buy functional mushrooms psilocybin however was of
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course qualified a number of years ago as a schedule one medication which meant that it had no therapeutic benefit and I
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think that was really based on the fact that there’s probably politics beside behind it but nobody had really done the
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research so you had obviously Native Americans these are natural medicines utilizing these and obviously gaining
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some insights and benefits and uh religious rituals things along that
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line but we know that psilocybin acts at the serotonin uh receptors in the brain
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so it’s a serotonin Agonist which means that it mimics a serotonin in the brain
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and the receptor sites that psilocybin or its analog silacin which is the
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active ingredient psilocybin has some hallucinogenic benefit but it also has
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some stimulating benefits within the brain so I think understanding a little bit of the science behind why
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hallucinogens work why in all of them whether it’s be MDMA or ecstasy As We
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Know It hawasca uh ketamine they all work at the basically the same serotonin
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receptor sites in the brain so that’s kind of the key Target area so what is happening when it’s mimicking serotonin
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explain what serotonin may be briefly in there how it why is it doing what it does so at the receptor sites uh
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serotonin and we know if you think back to Prozac which was a serotonin
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selective serotonin uptake inhibitor so it’s an antidepressant and and it was a
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not an Agonist but an antagonist so it would basically work at the same
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receptor sites in the brain as psilocybin would uh and there’s some interesting studies going on right now
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with ssris a selective serotonin uptake Inhibitors
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and psilocybin or MDMA at the same time so it activates these sites in the brain
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and to go layman term here these are happy sites yeah these are things that
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stimulate imaginative thinking uh allow people perhaps they’re in a depressed or
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a treatment resistant a depression orientation to have some better thoughts
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happier thoughts and therefore psilocybin over the years of course
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became popular Simple Simon or whatever you wanted to call it we you know I
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myself have taken psilocybin and uh masculine and a couple other things you
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don’t seem depressed though Jim is there you know it’s interesting I don’t know whether it’s just my normal happy nature
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but I’m just not a depressive kind of guy but I suffer for people with mental
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health illnesses who do have these uh depressive uh types of maladies and you
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know we know that these are significant in fact in the U.S market alone it’s
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estimated that we spend 240 billion dollars a year on Mental Health Care and
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most of it I think one would suggest is reasonably ineffective yeah and we turn
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people into kind of zombie orientation we give them uh doses of things that
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don’t make them happy but seem to actually uh more or less make the them
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unfeeling or numb what have you and that’s certainly not what we want to do and I think psychotherapists and others
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in particular in the last though I’d say four to five years have started to realize that maybe what we’re talking
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about in the 60s was a valid medication orientation that we needed to move to and therefore I think that’s why we see
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the explosion and I mean explosion in companies and people now going back and
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reevaluating the opportunity use psilocybin MDMA and sooner or later
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we’ll see LSD and some other things as well utilized in a manner that we hope
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improves mental health and decreases some of the abuses today so some good
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well I’ll get so many questions but one is you talked about the SSRI yeah
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to like the simplest form what is that doing from the antidepressant standpoint
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versus like uh this psilocybin right like just if you’re explaining to a sure
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a real novice yeah a neuroplasticity all this stuff no no you’re going to get
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into but let me just say that what we know is that uh and this is probably
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more hypothesis and therefore it’s under phase studies with the FDA what have you is that
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psilocybin where it seems to interact most effectively that it almost acts to
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kind of rewire some of the broken circuits if you know again to try to make as simple as possible ssris Prozac
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and all of its other analogs what have you certainly also work and in some
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patients they work reasonably well but in some patients they do nothing in terms of so there’s a question about
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whether it’s really helping to rewire things or whether it’s just acting as an
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exogenous a something that is mimicking serotonin but not actually activating it
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and I think that that’s kind of the key is that these natural medicines that we’re looking at seem to have the
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benefit of actually stimulating what I’ll call again kind of a better
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circuitry better rewiring in the brain as opposed to just supplying something
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that we could naturally produce with the right orientation right yeah for someone
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who has never done mushrooms before sure what what are the what are they what’s what’s to be expected obviously it’s a
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dosing question as well but and what are the some of the side effects yeah one might get from so so again you know
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first of all let me say this that uh well I think hallucinogens part of the reason that in the 60s and on they were
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scheduled is because they’re being used recreationally and I don’t think you know it’s no different than recreational
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Cannabis or if I was sitting here and having a beer with you guys at a certain level it becomes a personal choice but I
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believe that the hallucinogenic side of this business and the way that this is going to go is it will be prescription
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it will be therefore uh have certain indications and it will require some
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prior knowledge and Care associated with caregivers as well as patient education and I think that’s kind of where where I
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want to go a little bit is that what happens when you take psilocybin well it is dose dependent so I the working on
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some micro dosed applications which most people say oh that’s just Placebo however there is some evidence contrary
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to that that there is some long-term benefit but a journey dose something
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that you will want to have some knowledge of what you’re entering into oftentimes some coaching and which is
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now required by some of the states that are decriminalizing or authorizing the use of psilocybin is that you know
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you’ve got to understand you’re probably going to lose uh your ego kind of
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orientation you’re going to have some kind of disassociation and to try to
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make that a happy disassociation as important as opposed to a paranoid one so feeling uncomfortable is not an
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unusual side effect a little anxiety going into it even though suicide will
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eventually be used as an anxiety drug right uh some understanding of how that
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discomfort can be managed the knowledge that you’re in a safe place with people that care for you and care about you the
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fact that this will not go on forever that this will be something that you will metabolize and move through and
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re-enter your normal process hopefully with a little bit of a better Outlook in
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terms of what’s being going on with in your life so I think you know understanding what you’re going into
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understanding that you’re taking a journey dose which I say it is about 25 milligram it’s orally active changes in
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the body to silicon and it’s absorbed into the brain serotonin a receptor
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sites Etc so you know I think that’s a reality that people need to have and I
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think the safety issue around it is exactly why if you take a look at Oregon
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Colorado will go the same way that basically you have to be in a caregiver Associated atmosphere and the caregivers
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will be regulated so it means that you will have to meet some minimum requirements it’s also interesting at
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the state level that for example in Oregon which of course was two years ago they’re finally getting it figured out
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it’s been a long time coming but municipalities can opt out of the
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program so if you really take a look at a map of Oregon and uh where mushroom therapy will be allowed it’s basically
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the big cities the university towns as you might imagine a lot of the smaller
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areas and stuff for various reasons and I think there’s a fair amount of bias again still as it would be with a
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marijuana what have you is that they’re opting out of the being involved so but
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at the same time I don’t know if people know this but mushrooms are decriminalized in
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Washington DC you can go and buy mushrooms you can’t say I’m here to buy
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mushrooms you have to say oh I’d like to see what the gifts are that I can receive for spending fifty dollars on a
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a plaque of Donald Trump or something and that’s how it works really in DC
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yeah that’s the same with cannabis it has to be gifted but you can buy a gift
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and then part of the reward is that you also receive in cannabis or mushrooms so
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it’s a kind of kind of interesting how we work around the interpretation of the
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laws I think most people don’t know about Texas yes the great state of Texas
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is actually very interested in the use of uh hallucinogens for mental health in
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fact they authorize the University of Texas we’ll go into hookah Barnes or anything but uh uh the University of Texas has a
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center for psychedelic research now John Hopkins University University of Wisconsin
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uh NYU in London uh the the UK I can’t remember
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but there’s a lot of global interest in hallucinogens seems to be following the
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the Cannabis movement maybe it’s obviously a few years behind but it seems to be catching steam year over
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year it actually is moving quicker in a certain lot of ways right JW and I think it’s because you got to think about
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again here we are we know that uh investment drives Innovation investment
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drives uh motivates people to do things so 50 publicly traded companies now in
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hallucinogenic medicine 40 private companies a lot of uh you know again
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research treatment centers Wellness what have you they’re all moving in into this area so that’s stimulating it the fact
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that we don’t have good answers for mental health what we currently use from a pharmaceutical perspective today is
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driving it and you know it’s it does have parallels to cannabis in terms of
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how it will roll out on a regulatory basis but the FDA will never ever and I’ve said
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this five years ago and I’ll say it again today will never really authorize
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full spectrum marijuana as being a drug they can’t it’s too complicated there’s
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uh 450 minor components 86 major components and you can’t study that
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effectively you can isolate psilocybin you can isolate MDMA so now you know
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exactly what you’re giving to a patient and what you’re treating you can run a randomized double-blinded control trials
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which are what they require to go through phase research for FDA approval so the FDA will never approve cannabis
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the FDA will certainly and you can take it to the bank that they will have
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approved hallucinogenic medicines of various sorts Somewhere over the next two to five years oh wow fascinating
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yeah and moving quickly right now uh investment in the hallucinogenic space
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right now 2021 3.1 billion 20 uh 28
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seven years uh predicted to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 8.5 billion
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dollars so it’s a big Market out there again you can take a look you can take a look at a
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number of studies that are going on out there and these are FDA approved studies the other things of interesting to note
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is first of all the DEA drug enforcement agency is actually increased the quotas
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that they will allow people to produce of materials for testing in in this
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particular Marketplace another it’s what I’ll call another buying sign sure uh Biden Harris has a a bills that will
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allow more research on uh controlled substance that are considered to be schedule one which is where psilocybin
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MDMA what have you so more interest there Nida the National Institutes of
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drug abuse who whenever you went to them with a cannabis trial that had a positive outcome they would not fund it
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they are funding studies right now for the use of uh lucinogens for uh tobacco
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cessation smoking so again you take a look at all the regulatory signs are
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there the scientific evidence is building that this is a much better way to approach this and you can pretty much
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again it I don’t have to be a a Houdini to suggest that uh there’s magic
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out there it’s going to happen yes sir why why is it because all the people who went to Woodstock are in power now what
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what’s the reason that I think there’s more Enlightenment about what again the
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negative side of it what hasn’t worked major antipsychotics antidepressants the
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cost of mental health in this country what have you uh suicide push-back
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stress disorder and so forth and I think there’s a realization that if there’s something that could scientifically be
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proven to be beneficial we ought to go after it so again it’s not necessary necessarily a liberal a republican a
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democratic a Libertarian issue I think that you know at certain point everybody
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coalesces that if there’s a discovery that makes sense and improves Patients health that we ought to consider it and
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when you again you take the look at the burden of mental health illness and the cost to society you got to say hell what
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we’ve been doing isn’t working I think we really ought to try it yeah I mean this is a serious is a serious question
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but not not in besides people’s closets where they’re growing these things for kids where do you find these type of
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mushrooms in the on the planet where do they grow well and what makes them magic these ones right yeah psilocybin so
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there’s a lot of different strains of psilocybin which of course helps uh you you I should say it causes you to have
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to do some standardization and some things like that there’s been some activity of you can synthesize and I can
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tell you some major companies former divisions of Johnson Johnson for example there’s a company called Pure assists
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empiricists is synthesizing all the cannabinoids in fact I’m going
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to be a customer there is buying CBD for my pharmaceutical grade product but they
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also have done the same with psilocybin so you can synthesize it you can grow it
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interesting enough the major growth and it’s a growth market place as well is in
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Jamaica does it grow naturally or does it have to be no no well it does grow naturally
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if when I was at the University of Washington after a particularly rainy a
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season what have you watching students crawling around in the grass on the mall
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looking for a little psilocyber mushrooms yes it does grow through cow manure well the commoner is certainly
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one of the substrates that works but it’s also as much uh um you know if you chop down a redwood
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tree and let it sit for about 10 years it kind of starts to degrade and that’s just perfect growing area for fungi in
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general I mean you see it when you go anywhere where there’s forests and rain at a certain point you’ll find fungus
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growing yeah somewhere so uh uh you know I think it’s interesting so where do you
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find it so one of the ways that Allied Health and I got interested in it is
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that there was a little company gray market up in Vancouver Island who is
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selling ground up psilocybin in small doses with a couple of other uh
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functional mushrooms lion’s mane and cordyceps as I said and they’re selling it and by talking
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about effective doses they were sound like you know I said 25 milligrams of effective dose
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2.5 milligram doses that they were selling people could buy
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10 capsules for 20 bucks and they’d chip it out and this is where we started
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getting reports from vets who were using our product as well as First Responders which that includes the law enforcement
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uh emergency medical technicians what have you that were suffering from uh
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traumatic stress associated with their jobs or the war or what have you
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they started reporting that you know the Cannabis helps Jim but quite honestly this mushroom stuff is really kind of
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I’ve stopped drinking as much I’m not taking pain medication I’m sleeping better so and so forth so you know it’s
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those kinds of reports that sometimes give you that empiric feeling
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that you ought to move forward and explore this a little more because there is something happening and it’s good
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yeah so so what so the paranoia you know we’re talking about all the benefits and
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stuff what happens when you get that one patient that just gets skit like they go
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crazy from it well again it’s interesting obviously there’s lots of thoughts schizophrenia is a very
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different disease than depression what have you and so there’s some concerns that people that have other major mental
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disorders it may not be beneficial I think that requires proper research and control what have you so you know
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paranoia I mean uh you know I remember driving down the road one night with my
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wife we picked up a hitchhiker and it was a New Year’s Eve and uh I think we
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had ingested a fair amount of cannabis as I remember and the guy gets them back and we’re driving down the the road and
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he’s like oh dude dude there’s a cop up there so I’m like you know do I get that
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joint on my pocket they are swallow it whatever so you know people can induce
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paranoia pretty easily when you’re in a what I’ll call a altered state yeah and
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a cannabis has the same capabilities where did that cop end up being a streetlight a good tree nope not you
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know needless to say I told that this may sound cruel or unusual but I pulled
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over at the next stops and I said it’s time for you to get out but uh whatever
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uh it’s just you know paranoia is easily induced in people yeah and so if you
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know you don’t say I’ve never experienced that every year at this show yeah why are the the police here certain
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people bringing out of me a little bit more than others yeah we’ve all heard the term Jim the bad trip having a bad
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trip what is what does that mean and what’s going on well this is part of it right well again if you take a look at
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it and it is part of it uh uh again you could sit like I said with uh fit 500
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000 people at Woodstock and you took the green acid and they just told you over the loudspeaker anybody who’s taking the
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green acid you may want to come to the health tent here and so I’m sitting with
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the four other people we’re all saying how do you feel how do you feel how do
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you feel and I’m of course saying I’m doing the coaching stuff saying I feel pretty good so I think we just kind of
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chill here guys you did and what happened we had a great afternoon we heard some amazing music uh we partied
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on it late into the night and the next day we woke up and said yeah what did I do yesterday I’m like
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really but anyway so so you know again I think paranoia is a controllable and a
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safe place with coaching and an understanding I would never ever suggest
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that somebody just go and take uh loosen the gem without some knowledge or
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understanding or again being in a comfortable place with for friends people that they understand and yeah
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I’ve said friends of mine freak out where they you know ate a brownie they
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had a little too much THC in it and and you know when they beg you to go to the hospital
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you could take them but at the end of the day it’s like we’re just going to sit here because a few hours from now
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you’re going to feel a lot better yeah and and then the other thing about that whole
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suspension of you know kind of lucinogenic uh Bliss what have you is again this ego and ID thing is important
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I mean if you go into it and you’re already uncomfortable and paranoid and
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what have you if you go into it like me where I’m stable comfortable uh secure
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what have you it’s probably going to be a slightly different experience and I’ve certainly had friends and stuff who’ve had
31:36
prefer real bad trips but the bad trip was just something that we
31:42
needed to kind of let nature take its uh its own time and move on through it is a
31:48
bad trip just somebody freaking out like you said or is it like not be able to sleep for a long period so I don’t think
31:54
it’s it’s so much obviously again you’ve altered a bit of your serotonin and things like that I think it’s mostly
32:01
I’ll call an episodic anxiety Associated uh problem I mean again that as we know
32:09
this is one of the issues with recreational as opposed as opposed to control use of anything is that yeah you
32:15
take too much of something or you decide to supplement it with something else or you don’t know what you’re taking uh
32:22
yeah the wrong kind yeah you know I mean these are all the dangers and it’s why
32:27
really I think the benefit of some regulation and Regulatory Compliance and
32:33
some production related uh um controls of quality what have you and
32:38
I you know I hate to say this but you know six thousand seven thousand products are in the marketplace right
32:45
now that fcbd in them how much still good expiration date
32:52
uh what else is in there who knows kind of stuff it’s because the FDA has not
32:58
actually ever gotten into it once they finally do I would bet you right now fifty percent of the products that are
33:04
in market today will be uh uh analyzes mislabeled meaning it ain’t
33:11
what it says it really is in terms of amount uh things like that it’s it’s you know that’s the Natural Health side of
33:17
it and what everybody wants the opportunity and you know again I’m a pharmacist I understand all the good
33:24
thing about pharmaceutical companies and all the bad things about pharmaceutical companies so uh but the one thing that
33:32
they do is they do have their held to a standard to produce safe and effective products Natural Health Products it’s
33:41
the wild west out there and it’s it you know it’s it’s problematic from that
33:46
standpoint so while you can say well CBD is not going to kill you what have you I would agree with that you know the
33:52
lethal dose is uh you know you’d have to you know consume half a truckload of The Stuff Etc it doesn’t even exist
34:00
MDMA psilocybin LSD what have you there are
34:07
some limits in terms of what’s safe and to be
34:12
effective so you’d want some control over that in terms of some Assurance sure what are the reasons I reached out
34:19
to you so long ago to get this set up to talk I remember several years ago I like
34:24
to like to show 60 minutes and they had they showed us the story on a study where they did had 100 people lined up
34:30
in a controlled environment they gave them a measured dose of psilocybin they’d have somebody watch them and all
34:36
these things and then they’ll interview them after they fact and this is what got me thinking about all this but I
34:43
remember distinctly this woman going on there and she’s and she’s weeping Jim she’s crying in there and they’re like
34:49
she’s like I saw my deceased parents from 30 years ago where I had their most profound uh time of my life it’s in
34:58
during this episode and I remember asking my wife hey if somebody can guarantee you you’d have one of the most
35:04
profound moments of your life isn’t that worth trying and she ultimately said yes and she’s never done it but I it’s
35:11
incredible if you could tell somebody you could have this profound moment in your life you could revisit people maybe
35:16
you haven’t seen forever and well come out of it weeping because you have this experience like that’s that’s powerful
35:22
every idea and investment usually has a story behind and I can tell you right
35:28
now that many of the people that have gotten into this on a uh investment basis what have you they have a story
35:34
whether it’s about a loved one their son their child themselves
35:41
that they’ve gone through and they’ve had a good experience where they’ve improved the lives of their kids
35:46
whatever because of it they become I’ll call it the hallucinogenic
35:53
enthusiasts and they want other people to have that experience because it’s been a good experience for them so I
36:00
don’t find it unusual that if somebody kind of has what I’ll call a
36:05
breakthrough experience that they found beneficial hell of course they’re going to
36:11
recommend it to other people and they’re going to want to approach it so you know again I think we’re going to see
36:16
opportunities as we move forward here with more research and you know the list
36:21
is long of applications for hallucinogens in medicine obviously
36:28
treatment resistant depression major depression but there’s all kinds of
36:33
other things from fibromyalgia to I mean it goes on smoking cessation alcohol
36:39
dependency there’s a lot of studies and these are good studies these are FDA approved studies these people went
36:44
through investigation review boards they’ve been they’re designed the statistics of the study so you know in
36:51
the FDA uh uh pathway there’s four phases phase one through phase four phase three is uh
36:58
your pivotal trials that show the effectiveness what have you phase one is
37:03
usually a first in human studies just to show there’s some safety that’s the phase two are usually dose ranging as
37:10
well as continued safeties uh then phase three and then phase four are you found out that you not only have a product
37:16
that works but it might be good for something else so you want to test it further and see if it’s good for it but we’re going to see a huge amount and
37:22
there’s a you know uh the maps people I don’t know if you know what Maps is
37:28
multi-disciplinary uh uh Association for psychedelic studies
37:33
they’ve got some very good evidence now on some of the MDMA work that they’ve done and they’re all the way into phase
37:40
three and like I said you got you know everybody I mean High
37:46
ly respected uh um uh Health Providers University of Washington University of
37:53
Wisconsin Johns Hopkins NYU University of Texas whatever they’re
37:59
all formerly psychedelic centers they’re all participating in studies with these publicly traded companies because
38:05
they’re finding benefit so this is probably a stupid question but why did
38:11
the blacklight in these uh in the in the wavy colors bright colors become such a
38:16
part of that psychedelic culture I think I think that sensory perception
38:22
that there’s something going on right is you know it’s having again experienced
38:28
those things it’s the back Shelf at Spencer’s I mean you can’t not see it it’s well that’s what I was going to ask
38:34
can you take us on your like most insightful trip like something that made
38:39
you a Believer as you brought that up kind of a testimony on it well again most of the the ones that I did were
38:46
call recreational yeah because I was at concerts and things like that again been
38:51
you know they don’t have concerts like I used to go to yeah I mean you know live peace in Toronto gee oh yeah that’s uh
38:58
Yoko Ono and John Lennon with uh uh uh on stage oh yeah that’s Jim Morrison and
39:04
the doors up there and yeah a live piece in Toronto that one was
39:09
never seen Taylor Swift though have you I haven’t are you gonna give tickets to me yeah it’s quite quite a bit quite a
39:15
change yeah I mean you know Janet Joplin uh you know uh uh um I’ve seen all those
39:20
people uh uh you know and it’s exciting and uh it’s in a crowd that is there to
39:28
have a lovely time and you know sometimes fun can get out of hand we all
39:33
know that and we don’t want to be unsafe to anybody or others in particular but
39:39
you know to me they were always uh centrally
39:44
pleasurable experiences yeah uh the uh hallucinogenic side of it was
39:51
not something made me uncomfortable um the visuals The increased auditory
40:00
awareness I mean all your senses kind of tingle right when that’s happening so
40:05
it’s interesting too I mean uh I would mention again that I’m working
40:10
on a micro dose orientation which doesn’t require as much coaching and could be used on a more of a daily
40:16
functional basis and again there’s safety concerns about all these things what have you and they need to be well
40:23
vetted out but you know if uh you get up in the morning and a cup of coffee and a
40:30
little bit of psilocybin makes it a better day for you without any
40:35
noticeable side effects no hallucinogenic effects what have you
40:40
I think stimulating your serotonin Pathways is not a bad thing to do right
40:46
and these are there’s going to be more benefit you think ultimately than what they’ve done in antidepressants and
40:53
things oh I don’t think there’s any doubt in my mind that the side effect profile of naturally occurring medicines
41:00
is much less than some of the things that we’ve been able to synthesize and
41:05
develop another funny story because I’ve got a million of them so I was in China
41:12
I was in the yellow mountains and we’re on a tour of some sort and
41:18
gentlemen stand next to me obviously Chinese but he’s got a kind of a nice
41:23
green jacket on it says uh um Eli Lilly
41:28
Neuroscience whatever so I’m a pharmacist I know Eli I’ve worked for
41:34
him I’ve been to Indianapolis a few times I go over to him and I said so I I saw your Lily jacket I said uh what did
41:41
you do at Lily I’ve done a lot of business at Lily mostly on the commercial sales marketing support side
41:47
of it you know I’m a scientist I said oh really you see I just retired I said oh okay and I said so what’s the neuromus
41:54
Neuroscience Institute whatever he said oh you know that’s where we worked on like uh Prozac and stuff I said really
42:01
what he said well I’m actually the guy who discovered Prozac so uh kind of a a
42:07
funny story very very interesting very knowledgeable uh Chinese or origin
42:13
scientist who’s in his original Homeland kind of uh real mellow guy I’m guessing you know he was he was pretty much just
42:20
like one of these guys you’d say man I’d love to go have a beer with you and talk about how you figured this out so you
42:27
know stuff like that you think they figured some of this out based on some of the like are we doing a circle here where it’s an interesting question again
42:35
and the guys copied it synthesized it and then wait a minute then it got the
42:40
stigma or whatever you know how does Discovery happen and there’s so many Pathways again uh I mentioned that my uh
42:49
opportunity to combine cannabidiol with lipid lowering agents well
42:54
how do we get onto the fact that this might be make sense because most people say
43:00
how the hell does that work Jim well we happen to have some people that were having some problems back related muscle
43:07
related what have you and they had been to see traditional Physicians and the
43:13
physician said I don’t know what the hell’s wrong with you well they’d started taking a a a lipid lowering
43:19
agent uh uh HMG co-reductase inhibitor and what they found out is of course
43:27
that they’re having the muscle weaknesses and side effects that come along with it but for some reason none
43:33
of whether it’s because of the disconnection and Medicine in terms of information what have you but nobody
43:39
could come up with a solution we sent this guy some CBD it wasn’t legal at the time but that didn’t matter we sent them
43:46
some CBD a day later he was out back running walking and called up and said
43:53
what the hell did you guys just do we said well we sent you some CBD we told you to kind of put three drops under
43:59
your tongue and you know wait a while and if you don’t feel better tomorrow try four drops
44:05
and that’s when we said huh I wonder if a combination of CBD and so we went out
44:12
we did all the patent work that you need to do uh discovered there was a green field area there and we have uh two
44:20
major patents and we’ll have a lot of follow-on patents to utilize CBD as kind
44:25
of an augmentation to what we currently consider to be Western medicine related so you know it’s you know sometimes it’s
44:34
uh in the lab yeah and you notice it you know a rat responded positively to this
44:41
stimulation whatever and sometimes you’re with natural medicines you’re looking at somebody going huh I wonder
44:48
if that’d work and when it does you say that must work and so if you take a look you know you’ll see uh uh research from
44:56
states that have uh authorized the use of cannabis for uh medical purposes what
45:03
have you you’ll find out that ninety percent of the people who on their survey say oh I take it for pain management yeah I would say it probably
45:10
must be working for pain management and I don’t think it’s a placebo effect so so again I think Discovery is uh
45:19
interesting uh the fact that it happens we all benefit from them you know I’m
45:24
73. look at me I mean you know if my father died when he was 65 and uh you
45:31
know uh I’m sure some of the benefit is obviously good genetics and good diet
45:36
but I think that there’s certain amount of uh you know how many people would be sitting here today if we didn’t have a
45:43
mRNA uh uh for covid right yeah so on on
45:49
that Discovery path yeah how many people ate the wrong mushroom before they found this one and you know
45:54
I’ve heard that some die from you know you could die from them well obviously yeah but you think about the discovery
46:01
of that or like all the plants in the world and the guys somewhere in our ancient uh first uh
46:09
Native uh uh uh they’ve figured out there were some natural medicines that
46:15
worked and they worked effectively whether it be peyote or whatever and uh they’ve you know incorporated into their
46:22
mental health regimen and uh you know uh I think uh that was a good thing for all
46:28
of us so yeah I bet it was like hey Jim you want to come around the fire tonight we’re going to get JW to try to uh eat
46:34
this certain kind of mushroom let’s go into this see if he does let’s go into the sweat lodge and yeah don’t get the
46:41
exploding rocks though I’ve heard about that happening in sweat lodges you know yeah you touched on it briefly at the
46:46
beginning but the future of of psilocybin yeah it’s going going this tremendous movement it right now because
46:52
of the a lot of reasons you just spoke about what how in your mind where does psilocybin fit in in our world in say
46:59
five ten years is it a on the Shelf the grocery store is it always yeah you know I I
47:06
well it will be decriminalized I don’t think that uh I should say
47:12
regulatory tendencies in this country would suggest that if you’re a grower
47:18
and people will grow it uh that if you’re a dispenser and people will
47:23
dispense it that it will be regulated now so I think that will happen uh I don’t think you’re going to get
47:30
insurance companies to pay for it in fact they know you won’t unless it’s FDA approved product because they just don’t
47:37
I mean the first criteria for any insurance company is to have the
47:43
evidence that it’s safe and effective and the only way that they’ll do that is through the FDA so uh doesn’t mean that
47:50
natural medicines don’t work again well I would suggest that the
47:56
formulation that we’ve put under a provisional patent for Allied uses some
48:02
functional mushrooms in it it’s has what uh many people in the industry call a
48:07
stacking orientation where you take x amount of psilocybin with x amount of lion’s mane cordyceps niacin is a
48:16
nitrocurine vitamin but it helps in terms of flushing the product into the
48:22
extremities so the kind of the microcirculatory orientation so there’s there’s we’re going to see more of that
48:29
kind of stuff done the problem with combination products is quite honestly you can’t find what the FDA requires in
48:36
terms of uh certified GMP good manufacturing process raw materials that
48:41
you have to have to do the kind of testing so you know the regulatory hurdles are there but I do think that
48:48
the popular interest and the evidence is going to be such that so psilocybin will
48:54
come back and assume a role in terms of mental health again recreationally again
49:01
I I’ve done it that way but I certainly couldn’t suggest that people just wholesale go out and do that be without
49:09
the appropriate knowledge I think the coaching I think we’re going to see more therapy centers you’re going to see you
49:16
know the wellness treatment centers and stuff they’re doing ketamine right now and ketamine was approved by the FDA
49:23
three years ago in a nasal spray for treatment resistant depression and I
49:28
think that if they want to approved it if there wasn’t some evidence that it’s working it’s incredible how many people
49:34
did you did you say hi to people in this country are estimated with the data to use psilocybin boy I you know I’m not
49:41
real clear on that JW I mean I I know that again what the burden of illness is
49:47
but I don’t really know how many people are recreationally or
49:53
for medicinal purposes uh accessing psilocybin psilocybin can be accessed I
49:59
mean you know right uh Canada is a great example Health Canada put a uh uh
50:06
exemption in place so that if a physician will go through the hurdles for a patient the patient can actually
50:12
receive a psilocybin under Health Canada’s auspices of course Health
50:18
Canada also authorized for diagnosed vets with post-traumatic stress disorder
50:23
a certain allotment of cannabis that they’ll buy on a monthly basis so we’re not quite that advanced but uh that
50:30
being said I think a lot of This research and a lot of psilocybin uses
50:37
happens in Canada in fact the University of Alberta I would say is kind of uh the
50:43
academic center for a psilocybin and they’re mostly getting their mushrooms
50:48
out of Jamaica there’s a very big uh grow and types of areas there they have
50:54
like like Farms there they’re like real professionals yeah well in fact they have them out in uh uh British Columbia
51:01
if the the guy who started Lululemon he and his son are heavily invested into
51:08
and his son is the CEO of a company that’s growing suicide but wow yeah so you know it’s happening we have
51:15
thoroughly enjoyed this is enlightening stuff is there a um what’s my question is it I mean is
51:21
there anything we’re not thinking to ask you about this you know again I think I went through some of the science the
51:26
regulation the actual utilization uh kind of some of the economics in terms of uh how this goes some interests I
51:33
mean some people are concerned that uh you go through two or three good journey doses with guidance of uh uh uh
51:41
psilocybin or MDMA use what have you and you’re feeling well enough that
51:47
kind of the gravy train stops there so so unfortunately I would bet that it’s
51:52
going to be expensive when it comes to Market it’s going to be highly controlled uh and uh you know I think we’ll adopt
52:00
and adjust to it but with many other things sometimes it drives people to a great Market whatever because it’s costs
52:07
are sure are prohibitive to somebody oh I’m sure it’s already I think it is already happening I’ve seen some
52:13
documentaries on people doing Ayahuasca or whatever and like uh you know some guy Shaq with a couple of beds there and
52:20
trained professionals and stuff sure and I think people are wanting to believe that this is you know this stuff and so
52:28
I almost invite regulation on this kind of stuff for that very reason you know
52:33
uh because because passing those hurdles is really important I think when you’re
52:39
getting into you’re getting in some dark targets at the same time access to health is important to everybody and so
52:45
right and not making sure that people are blocking that right now right I mean uh if uh you if your insurance won’t pay
52:52
for it is there something else uh you know we have patient Assistance programs for all kinds of medicines and stuff the
52:58
number of one cause of bankruptcy in this country is oncology drugs that uh
53:04
patients can’t afford so I’d hate to see it go that way because I do think there is benefit but again you know time will
53:12
tell unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at some of these companies are basically become
53:17
patent trolls oh yeah so I’ve got 400 patents out there from the color the lights in the room to the color of the
53:24
carpet things like that that are kind of blocking techniques sure uh I understand
53:29
certainly the need to have IP around investment for protection’s sake but at a certain point it’s a little kind of
53:36
out of control too right well thank you for the time Jim yeah thank you hello I’ll ask one and I’ll get what my
53:43
partner asked the final one but you you went to Woodstock what was your favorite band
53:48
I think it was Joe Cocker oh how cool that must have been I mean that was quite a performance uh was that the
53:54
afternoon of eating the green acid like was that that evening like where was that in there thank you let me explain
54:00
some events rolling backwards I’m 73 is now 1968. I don’t have a clue anymore
54:07
quite honestly yeah but uh I had a heck of an interesting time it was obviously
54:13
a unique time in America a unique time I think in our culture and I think in a lot of ways some of the stuff we’re
54:19
talking about does have a lot of cultural oh involvement as well in terms of yeah
54:25
yes sir yeah so we always ask every guest at the end and I bet you have some doozies of answers here non-familial and
54:34
I would I would invite almost uh we could add as a category hallucinogenic
54:39
if we wanted to open those doors but the best day of your life best day of my
54:47
life without Fame no family stuff though right yeah yeah I can’t say I’m married because everybody knows you know that
54:52
that would be one yeah yeah I like getting laid but uh
55:00
let me think about it that’s a first but yeah um
55:06
golly I’m gonna have to reflect now which is you know the best day of my life uh it
55:15
doesn’t always just kind of I think it was probably when I realized that I had
55:20
passed an exam and I was actually going to actually become a pharmacist because I had failed that same course year
55:26
before but uh uh who knows uh I’ve got so many good days in my life honestly I
55:32
feel I’m like one of the Happy Blessed people on the planet and trying to pick out the best without familial kinds of
55:40
issues and stuff like that which are always you know very memorable and good but yeah yeah
55:48
you kind of answered that’s yeah that’s great passing that test for sure yeah I want to thank uh Wayne westfail and
55:55
Nancy Westfield who I call Mom for introducing me to you years ago so thank you Mom and Wayne thank you cap Tech
56:02
spanking Mike Thomas this last show you’ll probably cut us off when this is aired but we’ve enjoyed this gym this
56:07
has been very educational thank you very much cap tax Bank must be into appropriate investors I was going to
56:14
invest in anything today I’d take a look at one of the only two local banks here in Fort Worth so if you want to talk and
56:21
the guy will call you back middle of the night if you have a problem we’ve tested it but we’re not suggesting any Investments we’re not SEC regulated so
56:28
please yeah I didn’t disclose any company
56:37
enjoyed it [Music]
56:48
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