In the Túcume district of northern Peru, traditional healers called curanderos use the San Pedro cactus as an entheogenic agent in night-time ceremonies. The ritual is structured around a healing altar that blends indigenous and Catholic elements. The curandero administers San Pedro together with tobacco and perfumes, using whistling, singing, and rattles to moderate effects and call upon spiritual forces. Diagnoses often involve sorcery, and remedies include cleansing rituals focused on aromatic fragrances. A post-session integration called florecimiento involves blowing perfumed waters on the patient to assure health, good luck, and love, providing revitalization and cleansing through scent and breath.
Despite being classified as dangerous substances with no therapeutic value under the 1971 UN Convention on Psychotropic Substances, psychedelics have seen a resurgence of interest in psychiatry, psychoanalysis, and psychology. Based on 14 interviews with psychiatrists, psychologists, psychoanalysts, and psychedelic guides, this chapter examines how and under what conditions these professionals came to consider psychedelics therapeutic. It tests the hypothesis that an essential element in the relegitimization of psychedelics lies in the ability of proponents to make their use compatible with contemporary ideals of autonomy, particularly as expressed in mental health care.