DRUG THERAPY A DATED HOLDOVER OR EMPOWERING?

Re: "The quest for the ultimate cure for addiction" [Oct. 25-Nov. 1]

Ibogaine: memories of Hunter S. Thompson's writings, and memories of the
long-gone Hollywood Hospital in New Westminster back in the late 1960s,
where the senior psychiatrist believed that alcoholics could be cured by
means of LSD "therapy".

Every comment in the ibogaine article reminded me of what many
(millions) said about tripping on LSD. Counterculture counsellors and
therapists felt that LSD could bring such intensity to insight that
all would forever be different for those in need of personal renovation.

After decades in the therapy business, I'm convinced-as are many
others-that the "talking cure" (insight) is a tired holdover from
psychoanalytic assumptions, and that the behaviourist methodologies
come closer to achieving therapeutic goals. Some of them, anyway.

Mike Tropp

Vancouver