LSD is the best known of the indolamides. It was first
synthesized in 1938 by Albert Hofmann, a chemist working for Sandoz,
which was a small company at the time.
He synthesized it from ergot
(Claviceps purpurea), a fungus which grows on rye. He synthesized it
again on 16 April 1943 and some of it must have got inside him without
his noticing the fact.
"Soon afterwards I was forced to
stop my work in the laboratory in the middle of the afternoon and to go
home, as I was seized by exceptional restlessness accompanied by a
feeling of slight dizziness.
Once I was home, I went to lie down
and drifted into a sort of drunkenness which was not unpleasant and was
characterized by an extreme activity of the imagination.
As I lay
in a blurred state with my eyes closed, I experienced daylight as
extremely bright. An uninterrupted stream of fantastic images of
exceptional plasticity and liveliness, accompanied by an
intense kaleidoscopic play of colours, welled up in me. This state ended
some three hours later."
This is Hofmann's report of the
incident , the first account of an acid trip. Although Hofmann could not
imagine how the substance had got inside him, he decided to experiment,
and three days later he took the smallest quantity of LSD which could be
expected to have any effect at all: a quarter of a milligram. The
effect was overwhelming! Although he started to take notes on the
effects, 40 minutes later he was no longer able to write anything and he
asked an assistant to cycle home with him. A doctor was called after he
had arrived home, but he was unable to detect anything unusual, at least
in a physical sense. The psychic effects, however, were impressive:
large visual distortions: faces became grotesque masks, dizziness,
motor restlessness alternated with the feeling that his limbs were lead,
sometimes an inability to speak coherently all by taking a minimal
amount of LSD, a substance which, when administered in minute
quantities, proved able to influence something nonmaterial the
consciousness.
At first it was thought that LSD caused a kind of artificial psychosis. Later it was used as a psychotherapeutic resource. Later still, when masses of hippies started using it, this drug created a tremor in the US which was felt all over the world. All certainties, the American Dream, were rudely thrown into confusion by a substance which stood every certainty on its head .
It seems as if the use of LSD died out with the hippies, but this was never the case. Problems were prevented by the culture. LSD is generally used on an incidental basis: people used LSD a few times a year for a few years, until they lost interest in it. It is not addictive. As a result of these factors, and of the corresponding low price and minimal profit, the production and marketing of LSD did not take place in the world of crime. It is only criminal in terms of the letter of the law.
Recently there has been a slight increase in LSD use, probably under the influence of the Sixties revival.
LSD has an agonistic effect on presynaptic serotonin receptors in the midbrain. It also inhibits the activity of raphe neurons, which themselves brake sensitivity to visual and other sensory input.
This effect, like that of other indolamines, is based on the structural resemblance to serotonin.
There is no record of physical or psychic dependence. Tolerance for LSD is developed at such a speed that an enormous increase in the dose is required to maintain the effects in the case of repeated shortterm use, practically resulting in a refractory period up to 2 days after use.
The usual dose is between 30 and 150 micrograms; generally 1 microgram/kg; the effect lasts for about 8 hours.
LSD is a strong hallucinogen with very mild sympathomimetic effects. The effect depends to a large extent on the psychic state of the person. A slight increase in blood pressure and tachycardia can usually be observed. Mild muscular relaxation. The other somatic effects are slight dilation of the pupils, tremor, sometimes nausea, hyperreflexion, piloerection, and a slight rise in body temperature. The lively hallucinations are primarily visual in kind. It also reinforces existing or evoked emotions. Its use can lead to what are generally reversible (peripheral) psychotic states (flipping, bad trips), which usually disappear when the effect is wearing off. The sensitivity to bad trips is not necessarily dependent on the dose, but is primarily dependent on set and setting: the personality of the user and his/her mood, and the setting in which the trip takes place.
Luxation of preexisting psychiatric problems has been demonstrated in a study of 5,000 persons who had taken LSD at least 25 times. Among healthy, normal individuals, the rate of psychotic episodes was 8 per 10,000 trips, while among psychiatric patients the corresponding rate was 18 psychotic episodes per 10,000 trips, as well as 12 suicide attempts and 4 suicides per 10,000 trips.
During the Summer of Love in the Vondelpark in Amsterdam in 1972, where more than 4,000 people were regularly tripping, there were 112 requests for help: 8 were requests for information for the trip, 4 were requests for tranquillizers, 4 were cases of aggressive behavior, which could be calmed down without any difficulty, 92 were calmed down without any medication. There were only 4 cases of more prolonged psychoses (all among individuals with a very serious psychiatric background).
The most prominent of negative effects is fear, but is directed
against the person him/herself. Genuine agressive behavior is extremely
rare:
usually they are merely states of excitement.
No
satisfactory explanations have been found for the flashbacks, if the
phenomenon really excists.
Simultaneous use of alcohol is
discouraged in the scene.
Chronic Effects
Various negative effects have
also been attributed to the use of LSD that could not been proved.
In particular, chromosome damage has been detected, with the suggestion
of tetrogenicity.
However this "damage" proved to be harmless.
Further information on LSD can be obtained at the following pages:
Information on Medical aspects of LSD at
DrugText LSD Medical Pages