Peyote is a hallucinogen considered sacred medicine by members of the Native American Church.

It was formally legalized for church members in 1994 as

an amendment to the American Indian Religious Freedom Act. Buttons harvested from peyote cacti are purchased from licensed dealers in southern Texas.
 s the secret to alcohol

I T:ITLII (:499
EVEN WITH SEVERAL TABLESPOONS OF PEYOTE IN ME, BY the ground-up tops, or buttons, of peyote, Lophophora wifGam-
3 in the morning I'm fading. For almost six hours I have been sit- sii. U.S. law classifies the squat cactus and its primary active in-
ting in a tepee in the Navajo Nation, the largest Indian reserva- gredient, mescaline, as Schedule 1 substances, illegal to sell,
tion in the United States, with 20 Navajo men, women, and children. possess, or ingest. The law exempts members of the Native Amer-
They belong to the Native American Church, which has 250,000 ican Church, who revere peyote as a sacred medicine. 5 A barrel-
members nationwide. Everyone except the four children has eaten chested man wearing a checked shirt and cowboy boots stands

DISCOVER FEBRUARY 2003 69

over the cedarwood fire and murmurs a prayer in Dine, the Navajo nessed to help alleviate the pain and suffering caused by two
language. As this roadman, or leader of the service, sprinkles sage deadly diseases that have long been notoriously resistant to treat-
on the coals, my eyelids close. I smell the sage and hear it hiss, ment: alcoholism and addiction. More than 12 million Ameri-
and I see the roiling geometric patterns, called form constants, cans abuse alcohol, and another 1 million abuse cocaine or heroin.
generated by compounds such as mescaline. Then the balding Halpern's conviction that psychedelics might help alcoholics
white man on my right nudges me and tells me to keep my eyes and addicts is based both on research by others and on his
open. The Navajo might be offended, he whispers, if they think personal observations of members of the Native American
I have fallen asleep. Later, he shakes his head when I lean on an Church. Although Indians in central and northern Mexico,
elbow to relieve the ache in my back. Too casual, he says. peyote's natural habitat, have ingested it for spiritual purposes
My guide to the etiquette of peyote ceremonies is John Halpern, for thousands of years, only in the last century did this prac-
a 34-year-old psychiatrist from Harvard Medical School. For tice spread to tribes throughout North America in the form
five years he has been coming here to the Navajo Nation-27,000 of rituals of the Native American Church.
square miles of sage-speckled desert stretching from northern All the subjects of Halpern's research are Navajo, who account
Arizona into New Mexico and Utah-to carry out a study of for roughly 10 percent of the church's membership and hold key
peyote. Funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the leadership positions. Even though tribal leaders have banned al-
study probes members of the Native American Church for cohol from their reservation, alcoholism is still rampant. For the
deficits in memory and other cognitive functions. Halpern has Navajo and other tribes, rates of alcoholism are estimated to be
brought me here to help me understand him and his mission, more than twice the national average. Those in the Native Amer-
which is to provoke a reconsideration of the pros and cons of ican Church say their medicine helps keep them sober and healthy
hallucinogenic drugs, commonly referred to as psychedelics. in body and mind, and Halpern suspects they are right.
Coined in 1956 from the Greek roots for "mind revealing," He first took peyote himself five years ago, shortly after pre-
the term psychedelic refers to a broad range of drugs that in- senting his research plan to leaders of the Native American
clude peyote, LSD, and psilocybin, the primary active ingre- Church. "It would have been supremely insulting to them if I
dient in so-called magic mushrooms. Three decades ago the didn't try it. So I tried it." Halpern also hoped that firsthand ex-
federal government shut down most research on psychedelics, perience would help him understand how peyote ceremonies
and The Journal of the American Medical Association warned might benefit church members. He checked beforehand with
that they can cause permanent "personality deterioration," the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, which told him that it would
even in previously healthy users. Halpern says this blanket in- not object to peyote use by non-Indians for serious scientific,
dictment is "alarmist" but agrees that there are documented educational, or journalistic purposes. Halpern has participated
U
dangers associated with the recreational use of the drugs. When in five services in all, including the one we both attend, and
w
ingested recklessly in large doses, psychedelics can generate these experiences have imbued him with respect for the Indi-
harrowing short-term experiences, and they can precipitate ans and their faith. When I expressed curiosity about the cere- 0
long-term psychopathology in those predisposed to mental monies, he said the best way to appreciate them is to participate 0
d
illness. Nonetheless, more than 20 million Americans have in one. He warned me that the ceremonies are in no way recre-
tried a psychedelic at least once, and 1.3 million are users of ational or fun, and our session in Arizona bears that out.
the drugs, by far the most popular of which is now MDMA, Like most Native American Church services, this one has 0a
or Ecstasy. Halpern undertook his peyote research in part to been called for a specific purpose-in this case, to help a wife
test persistent fears that those who repeatedly use psychedelics and husband burdened with medical and financial problems,
0
run a high risk of brain damage. all too common on the reservation. Except for Halpern and
While recognizing that psychedelics are toxic substances that me, everyone is a friend or relative of this couple; some have m
should not be treated lightly, Halpern thinks some of the drug traveled hundreds of miles to be here. The meeting lasts for
a
compounds could have beneficial uses. "There are medicines 10 hours with only a single 10-minute break, and it unfolds
0
here," he says, that could prove to be "fundamentally valuable." in a rhythm of rituals: smoking tobacco rolled in corn husks; 0
He hopes the mind-revealing power of psychedelics can be bar- singing hymns in Dine or other Native American languages

EXPERIMENTS WITH PEQP ,

John Halpern's peyote study is part of a revival of psychedelic research. At least a half dozen
prominent researchers are exploring the potential of using hallucinogens, including:

Francisco Moreno, a psychiatrist at the Uni- * Pedro Sopelana Rodriguez, a psychiatrist at the
versity of Arizona College of Medicine in Tucson, Psychiatric Hospital of Madrid in Spain, gives
administers psilocybin, the primary active ingre- MDMA, or Ecstasy, to 29 women suffering from post-
dient of hallucinogenic mushrooms such as Psilo- traumatic stress disorder caused by sexual abuse.
cybe semilanceata, to 10 patients as an experimental =;: Evgeny Krupitsky, a psychiatrist at the St.
treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder. Petersburg Scientific Research Center of Addic-

V
 One early advocate of psychedelic therapy was William
Wilson, who founded Alcoholics Anony
to the pounding of a deerskin drum; eating peyote and drink- privilege to work with human beings and to heal them."
ing peyote tea passed around in bowls, three times in all. He traces his interest in psychedelics to the early 1990s. In-
There is a spellbinding beauty in the incantations of the road- terning at a psychiatric hospital in Brooklyn, New York, he be-
man, in the sparks spiraling up from the bed of coals toward the came frustrated that he could not offer better treatments for
tepee's soot-blackened roof, in the stoic expression of the elder alcoholic or drug-addicted patients. During a weekend at his
who adds cedar logs to the fire and rakes the coals into a half cir- parents' home, he vented to a visiting family friend, Chunial
cle. But none of the worshippers seems lost in blissful aesthetic Roy, an Indian-born psychiatrist who had settled in western
reveries. Far from it. For much of the night, the mood is solemn, Canada. Roy recalled that in the 1950s, he did a survey of al-
even anguished. Two people vomit, including the wife. Both she coholism among Indians in British Columbia and found low
and her husband sob as they confess their fears and yearnings. rates among members of the Native American Church. Roy
So do others as they listen, offer prayers, or divulge their own added that psychedelics such as LSD had once been consid-
troubles-usually in Dine, but occasionally in English. ered promising treatments for addiction and other disorders.
The power of these ceremonies, Halpern tells me later, is "I was so fascinated that I did all this research;' says Halpern,
only partly pharmacological. After all, worshippers usually eat who had never taken psychedelics and knew little of their his-
j ust a few tablespoons of peyote, which amounts to less than tory. He learned that LSD, mescaline, and psilocybin, initially
100 milligrams of mescaline-enough to induce a stimulant viewed as mimickers of the symptoms of mental illness, came
effect but not full-fledged visions. Peyote, Halpern speculates, to be seen as potential treatments. From 1950 to the mid-
serves primarily as an amplifier of emotions aroused by the 1960s, journals published more than 1,000 papers describing
ceremony's religious and communal elements. He cannot prove the treatment with psychedelics of 40,000 patients afflicted
this conjecture yet, nor can he say how or if the putative ben- with alcoholism and various other disorders.
efits of these sessions might be achieved by non-Indians in One early advocate of psychedelic therapy was William Wil-
more conventional psychotherapeutic settings. "A lot more son, known more familiarly as Bill W., who founded Alco-
work needs to be done to answer such questions," he says. holics Anonymous in 1935. After observing alcoholics
His creeping baldness notwithstanding, Halpern looks undergoing LSD treatment and taking the drug himself in
younger than his age. He can be brash too. During our week- 1956, Wilson became convinced that it might benefit alco-
end in Navajo country-where we visit a substance-abuse holics by triggering religious experiences like the one that had
clinic and meet a Native American Church leader as well as helped him stop drinking. The studies that instilled these hopes
attend the peyote session-he exults in displaying his knowl- in Wilson and others were largely anecdotal, lacking controls,
edge of psychedelic chemistry and his talent for mimicry. A or flawed; they were nonetheless suggestive enough, Halpern
nightclub owner once said his impressions were good enough thought, to merit follow-up investigations.
for a stage act, he boasts. (Actually he is good, especially at ob- After Halpern began his residency training at Harvard Med-
scure sitcom characters like Colonel Klink's irritable com- ical School in 1996, he found a mentor: Harrison G. Pope Jr., a
mander in Hogan's Heroes: "Kleenk, you EE-dee-ot!") professor of psychiatry who had investigated marijuana and
Halpern says he does have "an abrasive, sarcastic side." But other psychotropic drugs. Halpern and Pope have coauthored
he also has an earnest, idealistic side that comes to the fore when several papers, notably one that considers whether hallucino-
he talks about his upbringing. Raised in a Jewish home in an gens cause permanent neurocognitive damage, as some early
affluent New York suburb, he was never particularly religious, critics claimed. "At present," they wrote, "the literature tentatively
but he inherited a passion for healing from his psychiatrist fa- suggests that there are few, if any, long-term neuropsychologi-
ther and psychologist mother. They convinced him that "med- cal deficits attributable to hallucinogen use." They contended
icine is the highest profession you can have, because it's such a that most studies linking psychedelics to neurocognitive toxic-
ity examined too few subjects and did not control adequately
for pre-existing mental illness or for consumption of other, more
tions and Psychopharmacology in Russia, treats alcoholics and heroin ad- toxic substances, such as amphetamines and alcohol.
dicts with ketamine, an anesthetic that at sub-anesthetic doses produces It was to help resolve this lingering controversy that Halpern
out-of-body experiences. Krupitsky has reported positive results in his and Pope decided to examine the Native American Church,
clinic and at the Yale/West Haven VA Medical Center in Connecticut. which offered a large population that consumes a psychedelic
r Deborah Mash, a neurologist at the University of Miami School of Medicine substance while avoiding other drugs and alcohol. Halpern
who also works at a clinic in St. Kitts, West Indies, treats opiate and cocaine and Pope won grants for their project not only from the Na-
addicts with ibogaine, an extract of the West African shrub Tabernanthe iboga. tional Institute on Drug Abuse but also from Harvard Med-
mm Charles Grob, a psychiatrist at the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Tor- ical School and two private foundations that support research
rance, California, plans to offer psilocybin to late-stage cancer patients as on psychedelics: the Multidisciplinary Association for Psy-
an experimental treatment for pain, anxiety, and depression. chedelic Studies and the Heffter Research Institute (named
after the German chemist who isolated mescaline from peyote

of SCOVER
 Halpern found tentative evidence that psychedelics as a

and discovered its psychoactive properties in the late 1800s). trying to show I took the trouble to learn something about
Obtaining the cooperation of Native American Church of- their culture." He trolled for volunteers for his research by
ficials turned out to be more difficult. Many disliked the idea putting up ads in Laundromats and handing out flyers at a
of having their faith scrutinized by a scientist, especially a white flea market in Gallup, New Mexico. (The $100 promised to
one. After Halpern gave his pitch to one church gathering, a those who completed the study helped too.)
tribal elder harangued the crowd in Navajo for 20 minutes. Fi- One church leader who persuaded others in the flock to trust
nally he turned to Halpern and, angrily evoking the specter of Halpern was Victor J. Clyde, vice president of the Native Amer-
Christopher Columbus, exclaimed: "1492!" Another difficult ican Church of North America and an elected state judge. Dur-
moment came during his first peyote session. The roadman ing our trip to the Navajo Nation, Halpern and I visited Clyde
kept insisting that Halpern take more peyote, until finally he in Lukachukai, Arizona, where he lives with his wife and three
vomited. Halpern felt that the roadman's implicit message was, children. Clyde is compact and broad-shouldered, and he speaks
"You want to learn about peyote? I'll teach you about peyote." with the tough self-assurance of a former prosecutor.
Halpern persisted, coming to meetings bearing gifts of sweet When I asked what the Native American Church stands to
grass and flat cedar, aromatic herbs prized by Indians. "I was gain from Halpern's work, Clyde replied that scientific evidence
of peyote's safety should protect church mem-
bers. Just last year, the Pentagon cited con-
cerns about "flashbacks"-recurrences of a
psychedelic's effects long after it has van-
ished from the body-in barring service-
men in the Native American Church from
sensitive nuclear assignments. Didn't Clyde
ever worry that Halpern's research might
turn up harmful effects? Clyde eyed me mo-
mentarily before responding to my ques-
tion. If peyote was harmful, he said firmly,
his people would have noticed by now.
Clyde's belief that peyote does not harm
church members has been corroborated by
Halpern's research. He estimates that he
spoke to 1,000 Navajo before finding 210
who met his criteria. The subjects fall into
three categories: Roughly one-third have
taken peyote at least 100 times but have min-
imal exposure to other drugs or alcohol;
one-third are not church members and have
consumed little or no alcohol or drugs; and
one-third are former alcoholics who have
been sober for at least three months.
Halpern and several research assistants
administered a battery of tests-of memory,
IQ, reading ability, and other cognitive skills-
to the three groups. According to prelimi-
nary data that he has presented at conferences,
church members show no deficits compared
with sober nonmembers and score signifi-
cantly better than the former alcoholics.
Church members also report no flashbacks.
With his coauthor Pope, Halpern plans to
publish his full results in a peer-reviewed
journal this summer, after presenting them
to church leaders and Navajo health officials.
Halpern is already anticipating objec-
John Halpern, a research psychiatrist at Harvard, says he suspects that psychedelic compounds such tions to his research-for example, that its
as LSD, psilocybin, and mescaline stimulate "a center in the brain that is involved in spirituality." significance applies only to one substance

DISCOVER FEBR,UAR Y LUU;

class reduce addicts' craving during a post-trip `afterglow'
used by one ethnic group. "You could in one sense say mesca- dimethyltryptamine, or DMT, the only psychedelic known to
line is not the same as all these other compounds," he says. occur naturally in trace amounts in human blood and brain
His study nonetheless indicates that psychedelics as a class tissue. DMT is the primary active ingredient of ayahuasca, a
may not "burn out" the brain. "If we find this group of peo- tea made from two Amazonian plants. Like peyote, ayahuasca
ple that, with these special conditions, aren't having problems, has been used for centuries by Indians and now serves as a le-
that does have some relevance for the population at large." gal sacrament for several Brazilian churches. Recent studies
Halpern also realizes that he may be accused of going na- of Brazilian ayahuasca drinkers by Charles Grob, a psychia-
tive, of becoming so close to his subjects that his objectivity trist at the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, and others suggest
has been compromised. To reduce the risk of bias, he and Pope that ayahuasca has no adverse neurocognitive effects. An ad-
designed the study to be blind; those who scored the tests given vantage of DMT, Halpern says, is that when injected its effects
to the Navajo did not know to which group each subject be- last less than an hour, and so it could be incorporated into rel-
longed. Moreover, Halpern did not participate in peyote cer- atively short therapeutic sessions.
emonies with any of his research subjects. Halpern already has research experience with DMT. In 1994
Perhaps the biggest weakness of his and Pope's research, he spent six weeks helping Rick Strassman, a psychiatrist at the
Halpern acknowledges, is that its design precluded testing to University of New Mexico, inject DMT into volunteers to mea-
see whether peyote reduces the risk of alcoholism. Halpern sure the drug's physiological effects. That study showed that
would like to see that issue addressed in a follow-up study. An DMT is not necessarily benign. Twenty-five of Strassman's 60
ideal partner for a trial could be the Na'nizhoozhi Center, a sub- subjects underwent what Strassman defined as "adverse effects,"
stance-abuse clinic in Gallup whose clientele is almost entirely ranging from hallucinations of terrifying "aliens" to, in one case,
Native American. The center, founded a decade ago, offers con- a dangerous spike in blood pressure. Strassman's concerns about
ventional therapies and self-help programs, such as Alcoholics these reactions contributed to his decision to end his study early.
Anonymous, as well as various traditional Indian healing cer- An even more controversial candidate for clinical testing is
emonies. These take place in a yard behind the clinic that is large 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, more commonly known
enough for several of the octagonal log cabins known as hogans, as MDMA or Ecstasy. MDMA is sometimes called an empathogen
sweat lodges, and a tepee for Native American Church sessions. rather than a psychedelic, because its most striking effects are
Although peyote is not given to patients during on-site church amplified feelings of empathy and diminished anxiety. Advo-
sessions, staff members encourage some clients to participate cates contend that MDMA has therapeutic potential, and sev-
in regular peyote ceremonies once they leave the clinic. eral researchers around the world are now administering the
The clinic's records indicate that those who participate in drug to patients with post-traumatic stress and other disorders.
Indian healing ceremonies fare better than those who have par- Critics point out that MDMA has rapidly become a drug of
ticipated in Alcoholics Anonymous. Halpern hopes that some- abuse, with almost 800,000 Americans believed to be users.
day the clinic, perhaps with his help, will rigorously compare The drug has been linked to fatal overdoses and brain dam-
the relapse rates of patients who participate in peyote cere- age; just last fall, a paper in Science reported that only a few
monies versus other treatments. Ideally, to distinguish the ef- doses of MDMA caused neuropathy in monkeys. To help re-
fects of peyote per se from those of the ceremony and of church solve questions about MDMAs safety, Halpern and Pope have
membership, one group of alcoholics could receive peyote in begun a study of young Midwesterners who claim to take
a non-religious setting; another group could receive a placebo. MDMA while shunning other drugs and alcohol.
Halpern would never recommend such a protocol, how- All drugs pose certain risks, Halpern says. The question is
ever, because it would violate precepts of the Native Ameri- whether the risks are outweighed by the potential benefits for a
can Church. "Peyote taken the wrong way, they believe, is population. For example, the benefits of giving MDMA to ter-
harmful," he explains. Out of respect for the church, Halpern minal cancer patients to help them cope with their anxiety might
would never advocate testing peyote's effects on non-Indians, outweigh the risks posed to their health. In the same way, DMT
either. In this respect, he acknowledges, his affection for church or some other psychedelic might be worth giving to alcoholics
members does influence his role as a researcher. and addicts who have failed to respond to other treatments.
But there are many other compounds that can be explored Halpern also hopes to conduct a brain-imaging study to test
as potential treatments for non-Indians. In a 1996 paper, his hypothesis that psychedelics reduce craving in addicts by
Halpern reviewed scores of studies of the treatment of sub- affecting their serotonin and dopamine systems. "It sounds
stance abuse with psychedelics and found tentative evidence reductionistic," he says, "but a picture can be worth a thou-
that they reduce addicts' craving during a post-trip "afterglow" sand words." An ideal collaborator would be Franz Vollen-
lasting a month or two. This effect might be at least partially weider, a psychiatrist at the University of Zurich, who with
biochemical; LSD, mescaline, and psilocybin are known to positron-emission tomography has measured neural changes
modulate neurotransmitters such as serotonin and dopamine, induced in healthy volunteers by psilocybin and MDMA.
which play a crucial role in the regulation of pleasure. Some psychedelic effects have already been explained in rel-
One possible candidate for psychedelic therapy would be atively straightforward neural terms. For example, human

s
 'if you take it by yourself, you may have important insights,
but you've lost this other opportunity to learn and grow' *
brain-imaging tests and experiments on animals have shown tably Harold Koenig at Duke University, have reported find-
that mescaline, LSD, and other psychedelics boost the random ing correlations between religiosity-as reflected by church at-
discharge of neurons in the visual cortex. This neural excita- tendance and other measures-and resistance to depression.
tion is thought to induce form constants, the dynamic pat- Ideally, Halpern says, therapists should be able to choose among
terns I saw when I closed my eyes under the influence of peyote, many different settings to best serve a patient's needs. One of
which are also generated by migraines, epileptic seizures, and his favorite proverbs is, "Many paths, one mountain."
other brain disorders. But the effects of hallucinogens will Halpern believes he has benefited from his peyote sessions,
never be reducible to neurochemistry alone, Halpern em- albeit in ways difficult to quantify or even describe. Borrow-
phasizes. Decades of research have confirmed the importance ing the term for a compound that boosts the effect of a neuro-
of "set and setting"-the prior expectations of users and the transmitter, he speculates that peyote serves as a "humility
context of their experience. The same compound can evoke agonist," counteracting his arrogance by instilling awe and
psychotic paranoia, psychological insight, or blissful com- reverence in him. He acknowledges, however, that these emo-
munion, depending on whether it is consumed as a party drug tions might be less a function of the peyote than of the cere-
in a nightclub, a medicine in a psychiatrist's office, or a sacra- mony of the Native American Church.
ment in a tepee. In the same way, psychedelic treatments may Reverence is certainly evident in Halpern's bearing through-
produce different outcomes depending on the setting. out the session we attend together. Although plagued by chronic
The long-term challenge for researchers, Halpern says, is to de- back pain, he sits straight-backed for hour after hour on the
termine which settings can exploit the therapeutic potential of $5 cushion he purchased earlier that day at Wal-Mart. He in-
hallucinogens while reducing the risk of adverse reactions. In the tently watches every ritual, listens to every song. When the
1950s and 1960s, psychedelic therapy usually involved a single roadman asks everyone to pray for the husband and wife who
patient and therapist. In many cases, Halpern believes, psyche- are the meeting's focus, Halpern chimes in loudly.
delic therapy might work best for couples, families, and friends. Especially early on, the ceremony seems impenetrably foreign,
"If you take it by yourself, you may have important insights," he but its meaning becomes more apparent as the night progresses.
says, "but you've lost this other opportunity to learn and grow." At one point the roadman, after offering a long prayer in Dine,
People might also respond to settings and rituals designed turns to the husband and wife and says in English: "You must
to evoke religious sentiments. Recently various scientists, no- make more time in your lives for those who care about you." The
rituals, I realize, are just expressions of gratitude for earth, fire,
food, and other primordial elements of existence. After each of
us sips from a bowl of water passed around the tepee, the road-
man carefully pours some water on the dirt floor. Halpern says
in my ear, "Think what water means to these desert people."
As dawn approaches, the mood throughout the tepee bright-
ens. Everyone smiles as the husband and wife embrace and as
their two children, who have been sleeping since midnight,
wake up blinking and yawning. The wife, coming back into
the tepee after fetching a platter of sweet rolls, jokes and laughs
with a friend. As we drink coffee and eat the rolls, she thanks
us for having sat through this long night with her and her fam-
ily. "Thank you for letting us join you," Halpern replies, beam-
ing at her, "and may you and your family enjoy good health."
Driving out of the Navajo Nation that afternoon, Halpern
seems exhilarated, although he has not slept for 36 hours. He
howls along with a CD of Native American Church chants and
does imitations of Bill Clinton and several Star Trek charac-
ters. Outside Shiprock, New Mexico, his expression turns grim
as we pass a policeman giving a sobriety test to a wobbly young
man. Neither peyote nor any other medicine, Halpern real-
izes, can cure all those afflicted with alcoholism or addiction.
"We don't have magic pills," he says drily. If his research on
psychedelics yields therapies that can benefit just 10 or 15 per-
cent of the millions struggling with these disorders, he will be
Peyote ceremonies on Navajo Nation lands typically take place in a tepee more than satisfied. "I'm trying very slowly," he says, "to put
on a Saturday night and are followed by a communal morning feast. all the pieces in place." EK