According to a preliminary study conducted by University of Arizona psychiatrist Dr. Francisco A. Moreno, psilocybin, the active ingredient in ‘magic mushrooms’, may provide relief for patients suffering from severe OCD.

This small-scale test, the first of its kind since the drug was outlawed in 1970, was not enough to come up with any real scientific conclusions. More research has to be done to determine if there are any true benefits. Nonetheless, the results of the study are very interesting. According to MSNBC, all nine of the patients studied had some degree of relief, lasting up to 24 hours in some of the participants.

According to the article:

Currently, there is no treatment that eases symptoms of the disorder as fast as psilocybin appears to, Moreno said. Other drugs take several weeks to show an effect, but the psilocybin was almost immediate.

These results are simply amazing and I can not wait to see what further studies will show. If FDA-approval (and the staggering amount of bureaucracy and paperwork that comes with it) were not necessary for such studies, we may have a cure for Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder by now. More people would want to learn about that effects of the drug if it were actually legal to use. I know that when people push for laws that make these substances illegal they think they are helping others, but there are always unintended consequences. When the effects of a drug can not be studied, possible benefits from those drugs will never be found. LSD, for example, has been shown to be a possible cure for alcoholism. In that study, alcoholics who took one hit of LSD have been sober for 40 years, never consuming either drug again. We may never know the true benefits of these substances unless they are made legal.