Marijuana always had the bad rap of being called a “gateway drug” that leads users to try more dangerous drugs. While that idea isn’t true, the success of Marijuana legalization throughout America appears to be a gateway for the decriminalization of magic mushrooms.
This year, Denver, Colorado and Oakland, California both voted to decriminalize possession of the drug although it’s still illegal to buy or sell. The drug remains illegal federally in all 50 states.
The rationale behind decriminalization is that psilocybin, the active ingredient in magic mushrooms, has therapeutic effects.
A growing number of studies on the drug have found that it may be useful for treating depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, drug dependencies, and to assist individuals facing a life-threatening disease.
“We have many mental challenges on our streets today, and it’s important to be able to freely provide whatever medicinal support we can, including the use of plants that have beneficial effects for thousands of years,” Oakland City Councilmember Noel Gallo said according to USA Today.
Sensing that the decriminalization in Oakland and Denver may lead to a ‘shroom boom, just like the cannabis industry has enjoyed over the past few years, Silo Wellness recently patented a new way to ingest magic mushrooms: through your nose.
An aerosol nasal spray solves three problems that people have with eating magic mushrooms. They taste terrible, they’re hard on the stomach, and the dosing can be unpredictable.
Silo Wellness’s nasal spray emits a small “microdose” of the drug that lasts about 45 minutes. A larger dose can take the user on a heavy psychedelic trip that can last up to nine hours.
Silo’s nasal spray gives metered doses so users know how much they’re ingesting and there’s no taste or unpleasant stomach pains.
Given the fact that magc mushrooms are mostly illegal in the U.S., the nasal spray was developed by Oregon-based Silo Wellness in Jamaica, where they are legal.
Silo Wellness hopes to be first-to-market when states legalize psilocybin for sale.
“With proof of concept in hand, we are taking pre-orders and entertaining licensing proposals for research abroad and manufacturing for the product in advance of jurisdictions coming online legally, similar to Oregon’s proposed medical-marijuana-like psilocybin initiative,” COO Scott Slay said in a press release.
“We are so grateful for the opportunity to have an actual and real first-to-market consumer product in magic mushrooms. Most of us were too early to cannabusiness or too late,” Slay continued.
The company’s CEO Mike Arnold became a believer in magic mushrooms after having an incredible first experience with the drug at the age of 41.
“Mushrooms have been life-changing, and I want to share this healing opportunity with the world with a purpose-driven company mindful of consumer access to these gifts of nature,” he said according to Filter.
If decriminalization of magic mushrooms does happen on a statewide level, it’s likely to happen first in Oregon. Legalization advocates are currently working on getting an initiative on the ballot in 2020 that would allow “manufacture, delivery, administration of psilocybin at supervised, licensed facilities.”
The fact that psilocybin is illegal has more to do with misconceptions surrounding the drug than reality.
According to Popular Science, mushrooms are the safest recreational drug that one can ingest. They’re non-addictive, hard to overdose on, and send the fewest people to the hospital of any recreational drug.
Silo isn’t just stopping at magic mushrooms, the company is also perusing patents of psilocybin vaping technology and working on new ways to ingest other psychedelics such as ayahuasca, DMT, peyote and mescaline.