In 1943 the chemist Albert Hofmann stumbled on to a hitherto unknown substance in his Basel laboratory. After an experiment on himself he realized he had discovered an extremely potent agent that radically changes human perception. During the fifties psychiatrists started using the new substance, LSD, as a medication. In the sixties this “atomic bomb of the mind” started to wreak real havoc when it was used outside the clinics. LSD seemed to be tailor made for society’s dropouts. Then in the seventies LSD was put on a blacklist. Today such psychedelic drugs are being used legally again for the first time. Will LSD perhaps become a remedy once again just as Albert Hofmann always envisioned it? * French Premier