Interview with US scientist Dennis McKenna on powerful Amazon hallucinogen, plant intelligence and environmental crises

Ayahuasca, as it has come to be known internationally, is a plant medicine that has been used in the Amazon for centuries for healing and spiritual purposes. Renowned for the often extraordinary visions it induces – not to mention the deep vomiting – it is made from an Amazonian vine known to western science as Banisteriopsis caapi and usually at least one other plant.

Over the last 25 years or so ayahuasca has gone global, with many 1000s of people travelling to Peru and other South American countries to drink it, and expert healers – curanderos, shamans, ayahuasqueros, maestros – travelling abroad to hold ceremonies. Many drink ayahuasca because they’re looking for healing, some are just curious, some mistake it for a recreational “drug.”

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Source: Guardian Environment