From 'problem Child' To 'prodigy'? LSD Turns 75

Bern, Switzerland, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 12th Oct, 2018 ) :Lysergic acid diethylamide was labelled a "problem child" by the man who discovered its hallucinogenic properties in 1943: as it turns 75, the drug known as LSD may now be changing its image.

The late Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann famously learned of LSD's psychedelic effects when he inadvertently took a small dose while doing lab work for pharmaceutical company Sandoz.

He wanted the drug to be medically researched, convinced it could be a valuable psychiatric tool and lead to a deeper understanding of human consciousness.

But through the 1960s, LSD became synonymous with counterculture and anti-authority protests.

By the early 1970s, it had been widely criminalised in the West, prompting Hofmann to publish his 1979 memoir, "LSD: My Problem Child".

The book, in which Hofmann sought to reassert LSD's potential medical benefits, is featured in an exhibition at the Swiss National library in the capital, Bern, to mark 75 years since the discovery.

Hofmann died in 2008 at the age of 102 but he likely would have been pleased by a series of recent developments.

After decades as a medical outcast, LSD has attracted renewed clinical interest and there has been evidence that it can help treat anxiety and depression.

Such developments were what Hofmann was hoping for at the time of writing "My Problem Child".

"If we can better understand how to use it, in medical practice related to meditation and LSD's ability to promote visionary experiences under certain circumstances, then I think that this 'problem child' could become a prodigy," he wrote.