Spirit Plant Medicine Conference back for its 12th year

by Sara Harowitz on October 12th, 2023 at 5:18 AM

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Now in its 12th iteration, the Spirit Plant Medicine Conference is heading to UBC from November 3 to 5.

To be clear: this isn’t vegan-eating-type plant medicine. Rather, what we’re talking about here is the use of natural plant-based psychedelics and their potential for healing.

Included in the lineup of speakers is world-renowned mushroom expert Paul Stamets, harm reduction advocate Dr. Gabor Maté, Tsleil-Waututh Nation Chief Reuben George, and hashish educator The Dank Duchess.

The conference’s goal is to provide expert knowledge, inspiration, and guidance on the spiritual use and healing powers of entheogens: a group of psychoactive substances that includes ayahuasca, psilocybin, cannabis, peyote, Ketamine, 5 MeO-DMT, and MDMA.

“What’s being considered here is a total paradigm shift, where we’re talking about people having an experience and coming out the other side of that with a new skill set and a new way of thinking that can actually have them manage and move past some of those historical challenges,” Dr. Evan Wood, co-director of the Urban Health Research Initiative at the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS, says in a statement.

The use of plant-based psychedelics as a healing tool is thousands of years old, though it is only recently gaining mainstream recognition. In June of this year, the Government of Canada announced it was spending nearly $3 million on studying the benefits of psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy. The concept, in essence, is that these drugs (plants!) allow people to enter a higher realm of consciousness, unlocking traumas and working through them in calmer states than their brains would otherwise allow.

A 2018 study saw patients with severe PTSD engage in a trial treatment of MDMA. According ot the report, the results were “spectacular”—with approximately 70 per cent of participants no longer qualifying for PTSD after one year (and the remaining third having less intense symptoms). In addition, the improvements lasted up to four years—with no additional drug abuse or dependence.

A reported one in five people in Canada experience substance abuse or mental health obstacles. If psychedelics can help—especially when more widely-accepted antidepressant drugs are not working for everyone—why shouldn’t we let them?