Medicine Everyone Deserves

We advocate for community-based well-being and holistic health and help advance access to alternative medicines, connect our community with resources, and are the possibility of health and well being for all. With roots in psychedelic access reform, our expanded mission serves a broader landscape of physical, emotional, communal and spiritual well-being.

What we do by the numbers:

In Long Beach, California, nearly 15% of adults have been diagnosed with depression. Mental health challenges significantly impact vulnerable residents, with the highest burden of psychological distress and emergency room visits concentrated in the central, west, and northern parts of the city. 

Key Mental Health Statistics

• Major Depression: Approximately 5.4% of adults (about 495,000 individuals) in the broader Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana metropolitan area experience a major depressive episode annually.
• Substance Use: About 8.7% of people 12 or older in the metro area experience a past-year substance use disorder.
• Homelessness Link: Mental health is a primary driver of instability in the region, cited by roughly 15.3% to 17% of people experiencing homelessness in Long Beach as the leading cause of their housing loss.
• An estimated 650,000 to 780,000 cases of PTSD exist across the Greater Los Angeles area.
• Across general psychiatry, 20% to 60% of individuals diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder experience treatment resistance. 

So that means that, looking at PTSD, there are 100s of 1000s of people in the greater Los Angeles area alone that get little to no help from standard treatment modes. As a matter of fact, the standard treatments for PTSD do not cure the disease, they simply control symptoms.

So how well do alternative medicines work? Here is an example for PTSD;

The Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) has performed clinical trials on a drug called MDMA. MDMA has been around since 1912 when it was first developed by Merck. In the 1960s some psychotherapists experimented with a similar drug, MDA, for therapy and anxiety. In the late 1960s it started to appear in underground markets. In the mid to late 1970s chemists and psychiatrists began exploring MDMA as a tool to enhance psychotherapy. In the 1980s it appeared as the recreational drug Ecstasy and was classified Schedule 1 which made working with it difficult. 

BUT, now, finally it is being used as originally intended, in a clinical setting: where pure, pharmaceutical-grade MDMA is administered in controlled doses by trained therapists to help patients process severe trauma without being overwhelmed by fear.

Here are the key statistics from the MAPS Phase 3 clinical trials on MDMA-assisted therapy for severe PTSD:

• 71.2% cured: Nearly 3 out of 4 patients no longer met the diagnostic criteria for PTSD two months after finishing treatment. You read that right. CURED.
• 46.2% fully asymptomatic: Nearly half of all patients achieved complete clinical remission from their symptoms.
• 88% showed major improvement: The vast majority of participants experienced a drastic reduction in the severity of their trauma symptoms.

We work with doctors, practitioners and researchers advancing the field. We hold events that draw together our Community and these experts to help people understand and access alternative medicines. Currently, we are building the Orange Pages, the only international comprehensive directory of all alternative and complimentary medicine practitioners to help folks find available solutions AND we are in the process of creating a retreat facility to expand access and care. This is where we need your help.