psychoactive cacti

[orbsycli]

Can anybody explain to me why peyote is illegal but san pedro is not?
they both contain mescaline-which is an illegal substance...so why isn't san pedro and other cacti like peruvian torch illegal?

[Turtle]

Must not of come to the attention of the authorities yet.

[Biochemist]

Originally Posted by orbsycli

Can anybody explain to me why peyote is illegal but san pedro is not?
they both contain mescaline-which is an illegal substance...so why isn't san pedro and other cacti like peruvian torch illegal?

Assignment of a particular drug to "schedule I" of controlled substances is based solely on potential for abuse. If an item shows up regularly in the public eye as an abuse risk, it may pop up on Schedule I. Everything on Schedule I is illegal (e.g., heroin, marijuana, LSD, etc) and is not approved for use as a medication. The schedules go from I to V (based on decreasing potential for abuse only). After that, the remainder of prescription drugs are "legend" drugs, that are still controlled for safety (like most antibiotics) but not because of potential for abuse. Some Schedule I meds (e.g., Marijuana) can be approved conditionally for medical use, and then could show on more than one schedule, depending on usage. Schedule II drugs are legal, but tightly controlled (e.g., morphine, Demerol, Percodan, Percocet, cocaine, etc) because they have legitimate medical use, but also high potential for abuse.

Heroin is perhaps one of the odd ones, in that it is pharmacologically indistinguishable from morphine (although six times as potent), and yet it is illegal. The potency factor just means you use one-sixth the dose for the same effect. Heroin is a legal pharmaceutical in some other countries. The feds made the decision to outlaw heroin ages ago, based on the fact that there is no advantage in having heroin on the market (since it offers no additional therapeutic advantage) and yet most illegal traffic is in heroin, not morphine (becasue you get almost six times as much effective usage/dollars from a given quantity of opium).

There are hundreds of drugs (modifications to existing drugs and many plant alkaloids) that have psychoactive pharmacology, and could be abused, but they have not hit the radar screen of the feds yet.

[orbsycli]

hooray! thanks for the replies.

[C1ay]

Originally Posted by Biochemist

Heroin is perhaps one of the odd ones, in that it is pharmacologically indistinguishable from morphine (although six times as potent), and yet it is illegal. The potency factor just means you use one-sixth the dose for the same effect. Heroin is a legal pharmaceutical in some other countries. The feds made the decision to outlaw heroin ages ago, based on the fact that there is no advantage in having heroin on the market (since it offers no additional therapeutic advantage) and yet most illegal traffic is in heroin, not morphine (becasue you get almost six times as much effective usage/dollars from a given quantity of opium).

Odd thing about that mentality though. Fentanyl is legal for medicinal use and it is around 80 times as potent as morphine. Me thinks the left hand is not paying any attention to the right hand.

[Biochemist]

Originally Posted by C1ay

Odd thing about that mentality though. Fentanyl is legal for medicinal use and it is around 80 times as potent as morphine. Me thinks the left hand is not paying any attention to the right hand.

There are a lot of narcotic analogs that are more potent than morphine. Etorphine is about 10,000 times morphine potency and is legal as well, but it is only for veterinary use (in really large anumals- that is how they knock down rhinos).

The issue is not the potency of the drug per se, but that heroin is easy to manufacture. Heroin is a simple di-acetylation of morphine from opium.

Within reason, potency has no bearing on drug efficacy. It does, however, increase the net cash to a drug dealer if they can relatively easily treat a substrate and get six times the effective drug amount.

Fentanyl, Demerol, etorphine, and even the more potent orals (e.g., oxycodone, methadone) are more difficult to manufacture. Fentanyl is not used becasue it is more potent, but because it is very short acting, hence useful for surgery.

[orbsycli]

this is hypothetically speaking only:
the shaman method of preparing such cacti for rituals calls for hours of boiling it, until it is liquid.
is it possible that if one were to boil this without a lid or cover on the pot, that the psychoactives would be evaporated with the water?

[Biochemist]

Originally Posted by orbsycli

..the shaman method of preparing such cacti for rituals calls for hours of boiling it, until it is liquid...is it possible that if one were to boil this without a lid or cover on the pot, that the psychoactives would be evaporated with the water?

Usually not. Typically plant alkaloids that are psychoactive are not ever liquid any temp, and would not boil off. They could denature with heat (as many do-thank goodness- that is why we boil stuff to sterilize), but not boil off.