The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 279 No 7476 p508
3 November 2007

This article
Reprint   Photocopy

PDF 110K, Acrobat Reader

Liberates strange dreams

A modest proposal to help smokers quit

Does this ancient remedy really confer increased longevity?

Liberates strange dreams

Bearded, stocky beat poet Allen Ginsberg has just sampled the psilocybin in Timothy Leary’s magic mushrooms, causing him to throw off his clothes and proclaim himself the Messiah come to preach love to the world, thereby inventing hippies and also possibly Barry White …

Ginsberg soon heard of a rival to psilocybin that promised to raise his consciousness to an even higher level. LSD (for such it was) had already been around for over a decade by this time, having first been synthesised by Albert Hofmann in the Sandoz Laboratories in 1943.

Hofmann was among the first to sample his creation and experience its effects, which he described as follows: “The faces around me appeared as grotesque, coloured masks; [there was] a heavy feeling in the head, limbs and body [and I had] a clear recognition of my condition. … I sometimes observed, in the manner of an independent observer, that I shouted half insanely.”

After a few hours of this, Hofmann fell asleep and awoke the following morning, “feeling perfectly well” — and lived another 60 years.

Hofmann originally hoped that lysergic acid diethylamide (in German lyserg saeure diethylamid, which is why it is not LAD) might have some use in the treatment of psychological disorders; but the intensity of its side effects ruled out any therapeutic application.

Later, however, as world war gave way to cold war, several medical and psychiatric institutes in the US initiated simultaneous research programmes into LSD’s psychological effects — which led some to speculate that the Central Intelligence Agency was considering using it as a truth drug for interrogating enemy agents.

Whatever the motivation, it meant that anyone wishing to sample the effects of LSD simply had to register for their nearest research programme — which Ginsberg duly did, at the Palo Alto Institute.

Another establishment with an LSD programme was the Veterans Administration Hospital in nearby Menlo Park. Since its chief purpose was the care and rehabilitation of combat veterans, it is to be hoped that residents were excluded; as it was, a volunteer could earn $20 (then about £4) to sample LSD, along with other psychoactive substances.

One volunteer was a creative writing student at Stanford University by the name of Ken Kesey, who even took a job as a night attendant on the hospital so he did not have to leave too soon. One night as he was about his work, a tall, mute Native American appeared before him, who was to become Chief Broom, the narrator of Kesey’s first book ‘One flew over the cuckoo’s nest’ (the one who smothers Jack Nicholson at the end of the film).

Kesey left the hospital a convert to the wonders of LSD and like all converts, impatient to share his message with the world.

Back to Top

A modest proposal to help smokers quit

It is of course too early to tell whether the latest government campaign to convince smokers to quit by putting pictures of the end stages of smoking-related conditions (including death) on the packets will have any perceivable impact.

It is just that, as I pointed out in a letter to the Department of Health, shock tactics are hardly new, so why should they work this time?

I went on to suggest that it was surely better to use an approach, which to my knowledge has never been tried: instead of trying to frighten smokers, we should insult and belittle them.

I included a list of suitable slogans from off the top of my head by way of illustration, some of which I reproduce below; see what you think:

• “What’s so great about lung cancer, stupid?”

• “You can afford these, then?”

• “Oi, idiot, what part of ‘dead’ don’t you understand?”

• “Get this loser, girls”

• “That’s right — teach your kids to kill themselves”

• “You realise you could play better football with both legs?”

I went on to suggest that each warning should be covered, so that they do not know which one they are getting until they open the packet, so they do not end up choosing the one that applies to them the least, like the late comedian Bill Hicks, who always chose the “smoking lowers sperm count” packs, since he did not intend to have kids anyway. I will not tell you what their response was — suffice to say it was dismissive.

They say they want pharmacists to become involved in their health campaigns but they do not really mean it.

Back to Top

Does this ancient remedy really confer increased longevity?

Despite its name, Oleo europaea, the olive tree is Middle Eastern in origin, generally believed to have been first cultivated in Palestine. There are two subtypes, longifolia and latifolia; the latter’s fruits are larger but the longifolia has always been considered to give the best oil.

Olives are harvested as close as possible to the precise moment when the fruit starts to turn from green to black; speed is essential, since by tradition (and latterly, by law) no olive that falls to the ground may be sold as food, either raw or as oil. These rejects used to be made into lamp oil, which is why the Italians, who today play a major role in farming olives, refer to them as lampante.

To minimise the proportion of the crop suffering this fate, olives are picked and pressed within hours; the first pressing earns the right to be called extra virgin olive oil, which is the gold standard. Subsequent pressings are merely virgin.

References to the olive go as far back as Genesis, in which an olive branch is brought back to the Ark by the dove after the raven went AWOL. Although it is chiefly used as a food today and its pharmaceutical application limited to softening earwax, in ancient times it was a different story.

Greek and Roman apothecaries recommended it for a range of ills, including alopecia, constipation, various cardiac disorders and hyperrhidosis. Recent clinical investigations have also shown that it increases urinary output and raises the level of uric acid in the urine, suggesting that it may be useful as a mild uricosuric.

Most people, however, are more interested in the perceived cardiovascular benefits of olive oil, believing it to be the main, if not the sole reason for the superior levels of longevity enjoyed in the Mediterranean as opposed to northern Europe. There are any number of other possible factors, however: climate, the pace of life, support from the extended family — or maybe just because it is impossible to deep fry in olive oil.

So it will be decades yet before it can be demonstrated conclusively that the Mediterranean diet really does confer increased longevity.

Back to Top