Last Wednesday, 30th April, Albert Hofmann, the Swiss chemist who discovered the hallucinogenic drug LSD, died of a heart attack at his home in Basel at the age of 102.Mr Hofmann first produced LSD in 1938 while researching the medicinal uses of plants, in particular a type of crop fungus. While working with the drug in the Sandoz pharmaceutical laboratory a few years after first producing it, Mr Hofmann accidentally ingested some of the drug through his fingertips.He went home and experienced what he described as visions of "fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colours".
Hofmann argued for decades that LSD could help treat mental illness and over 2000 research papers were published on the drug, offering hope for sufferers of a range of conditions from drug and alcohol addiction to psychiatric illnesses of various kinds. However, in the 1960s it became a popular street drug and was soon made illegal, much to Hofmann's regret, and he was forced to concede that LSD could be very dangerous in the wrong hands.Albert Hofmann obituary
No comments:
Post a Comment