(Credit: Shutterstock) In a 1973 study, scientists at the University of Chicago fitted cocaine-dependent rhesus monkeys with stainless steel catheter harnesses, allowing them to self-administer PCP to until they were “highly intoxicated.” This type of research isn’t exactly unusual — for decades, humans have been pumping primates full of psychedelics like LSD and DMT to study the effects of hallucinogenic drugs. But in a recent first, researchers at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte in Brazil gave ayahuasca, a potent entheogenic brew from the Amazon Basin, to common marmosets. Ayahuasca has been studied in rodents and humans before, but not non-human primates. And strangely — or not-so-strangely, depending on who you ask — the drug seemed to help the monkeys’ depression.
Alternative Treatments
These days, ayahuasca is often conflated with kale-crunchers in San Francisco or New York who join shaman-led, soul-searching group therapy sessions with plenty of vomiting—the drink can cause great gastrointestinal distress. But its use dates back hundreds of years among Amazonian tribes, and according to one study, regular ayahuasca users “performed better in neuropsychological tests, scored higher in spirituality and showed better psychosocial adaptation.” Ayahuasca has been shown to be generally safe and non-addictive, illuminating well-being with fast-acting anti-depressive effects in just one dose. Despite a recent study inThe Lancet, which showed that 21 antidepressants work better than placebo, we need better treatments for depression. About a third of people still don’t respond to treatment, while it can take weeks for a drug to begin working. For the majority, reaching full remission is unobtainable.
