Costa Rican Center a Leader in Alernative Ibogaine Therapy

Addiction Treatment Industry Newswire

09/11/2012 – ATIN- There have been many fad treatments in the addiction treatment drug rehab and alcohol rehab space over the years – Terren Peizer’s Hythiam Inc. burned through $140M trying to get its Prometa Protocol off the ground a few years back – but the promoters of Ibogaine insist that their therapy is much more than just a passing addiction treatment fancy. Pointing out that Ibogaine, which is ingested as a capsule and taken from the root of a plant, has been around since the late 1960s, the treatment’s backers say that its longevity, and steadily growing numbers of adherents, put Ibogaine in a different class. “We certainly think that it qualifies as much more than just a passing fad,” says Lex Kogan, arguably the leading proponent of Ibogaine treatment, along with his partner Eric Taub. Kogan estimates there are between 10 and 20 clinics that specialize in Ibogaine addictions care, mostly located in Latin America, and that 1,000 people a year are currently undergoing treatment with 20,000 having taken Ibogaine for addictions over the last several decades. When Kogan talks about how Ibogaine works it is reminiscent, frankly, of Harvard’s Timothy Leary and the mind expansion efforts that were all the rage in the 1960s. Kogan admits straight up that Ibogaine falls way outside regular medicine. “This is not mainstream science,” he says. But both Kogan and Taub are clearly sincere in their belief in Ibogaine and have for more than a decade been diligently promoting it as useful in the process of recovery from addiction to drugs and alcohol. Putting their money where their mouth is, two years ago they opened Envision Recovery in the picturesque – and politically stable and relatively crime free – central mountainous district of Costa Rica in Central America. A tiny obviously high quality six bed outfit, Envision has just turned the corner financially, according to Kogan. Next up? Kogan and Taub are moving downstream in what economists would call a vertical integration play…a farm to grow the root from which Ibogaine is derived. POST YOUR COMMENTS BELOW..start a debate! GOT ADDICTION INDUSTRY NEWS? tell us…