Ecstasy Pushed as PTSD Treatment

Our society, for whatever reason, rarely considers the benefits of illegal drugs for useful purposes. Marijuana, for example, does have legitimate medical purposes, but is still frowned on by the establishment, despite being much less harmful for the body than alcohol.

And here is a new report about the possible effects of ecstasy:

If you're a veteran, having trouble getting over your battlefield time, a South Carolina psychiatrist would like to get you really, really high.

Michael Mithoefer, a former emergency room physician turned psychiatrist, is testing the party drug ecstasy as a treatment for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

"I heard about it and I decided to give it a try,” a former Army Ranger tells Military.com. "It’s an extremely positive thing. I feel so lucky that I got to take part in the project... It’s basically like years of therapy in two or three hours. You can’t understand it until you’ve experienced it."

Mithoefer has been conducting the FDA-approved tests with ecstasy, known clinically as MDMA, since 2004. "People are able to connect more deeply on an emotional level with the fact they are safe now," he explained to the Guardian, in the trials' early days.

I have no doubts that ecstasy has a number of helpful mental health benefits. But will society relent? Highly doubtful.