So far this season, the National Geogrpahic series Drugs, Inc. has delved into crack, hash and hallucinogens. The latter episode focuses on LSD, mushrooms, ayahuasca and ibogaine.
The program has a tabloid feel, with actual scenes of drug use and foreboding music. Two of the "Hallucinogens" segments (mushrooms, LSD) have positive outlooks. The segments on ayahuasca and ibogaine feature questionable practitioners. One of the two LSD segments is about a narc who was exposed to a huge dose and almost died.
In Texas, a man name Dan suffers from excruciating cluster headaches. His wife read online that psilocybin mushrooms could help alleviate the pain, so Dan starts growing his own. He crushes them up and puts them into capsules. By the end of the segment, he's happily fishing with his daughter. "The choice is very simple for me," Dan explains. "Suicide or psychedelics.
In Switzerland, a breast cancer patient is given LSD as a therapy to deal with the end of life. It appears to work for her.
In Peru, Rob Velez administers the jungle concoction ayahuasca to psychonauts at his Shimbre Center. The segment zeroes in on a woman trying to deal with being sexually abused as a child, She vomits and shakes uncontrollably. But by the end of the segment, she seems to have dealt with her issues.
In Canada, former heroin junkie Dmitri Mugianis provides iboga (an African psychedelic from Gabon) to several opiate addicts. Mugianis is shaken when his experiment in a backwoods cabin doesn't go so well.
Drugs, Inc. (Sundays at 9 pm EST) is more exploitative than educational. Watch with caution.
