Just when you thought magic mushrooms couldn’t possibly have any more tricks up their sleeve, they leave the crowd in awe once more.

Psilocybin, a psychedelic compound found in select types of mushrooms, may fight symptoms caused by long COVID according to reports and a new case study.

Published on the 28th of May, 2024, the case study by Dr. Joel Castellanos and others involved a 41-year-old woman who experienced significant symptomatic relief of long COVID syndrome after self medicating with psilocybin and MDMA. Long-COVID, also known as post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection (PASC), is the syndrome many have reported suffering after contracting the SARS-CoV-2 virus, and often includes fatigue, depression, anxiety, joint pain, headaches, and cognitive impairment.

After trying various traditional treatments such as medication, fasting, physical therapy, and meditation, the patient found little success. Feeling helpless by her failed attempts, she decided to try psychedelics (with the guidance of a therapist). And after three sessions of a combined protocol of psilocybin and MDMA, she reported a complete remission.

While one case study isn’t enough to say with certainty that any single treatment is a cure-all, there have been similar reports surfacing.

Ruth, 31, suffered Long COVID symptoms for over a year. Fatigued, short of breath, and compounding complications with her heart, cognition, menstrual and gastrointestinal problems lead her to try psychedelics in an attempt to find any relief she could. After a single five gram dose of psilocybin in December of 2021, she saw remarkable improvements. She woke up the next morning with her brain fog cleared, motor dysfunction gone, and heart rate back to normal.

“That’s probably difficult for a lot of people to process or believe,” said Ruth. “But it really worked.”

Another case even helped a man regain his sense of smell and taste after losing them to COVID. With just a single session, he went from having zero smell to regaining 95-100% of it over night.

Dr. Sue Sisley, who works in a community Long COVID clinic, also researches psilocybin at Scottsdale Research Institute in Phoenix. Apprehensive of this type of treatment at first, Sisley’s interest in using psychedelics to combat Long COVID came after patients told her they were having success on their own, reporting improved memory, energy, and cognitive function. “I was initially skeptical,” she said. But “none of the medications I was [prescribing] for them were helping substantially,”. Dr. Sisley recently advised lawmakers on a bill which would provide up to $30 million to research the therapeutic potential of psilocybin for Long COVID, plus another 12 conditions.

This is a testament to people taking health into their own hands, the power of natural remedies, and the ripple effect it can have on the political and scientific communities. Though psychedelics still carry a withering taboo around them within the mainstream, in 2010 it was estimated that there were over 32 million lifetime users in the United States alone. These compounds included psilocybin, LSD, mescaline, and peyote. It’s important to note that serious precautions, research, and safety measures must be taken before ingesting psychedelics to minimize risk. Regarding the healing affects against long COVID, professionals agree that more testing and trials are needed to come to any conclusions. If only that would have been the case for the COVID vaccines as well.

Mushrooms are natural decomposers, capable of breaking down everything from herbicides to plastic, and even heavy metals. It’s worth mentioning that vaccines have a long history of containing metals in them, including mercury and aluminum. Could it be that the mushrooms are actually breaking down the vaccine in addition to improving things like regulating neurotransmitters and reducing inflammation in the central nervous system? Further testing should also be done to determine whether or not the COVID-19 vaccines are also contributing to long COVID. In the meantime, nature continues the good fight against the manmade virus.