Among 1,206 Israeli nature rave party attendees surveyed online, the most common illicit substances used in the past year were cannabis (62.2%), LSD (41.4%), MDMA (31.7%), mushrooms/psilocybin (23.9%), ketamine (19.6%), and cocaine (17.2%). A weak but significant association appeared between harm reduction behaviors and positive attitudes toward harm reduction interventions (r = .26) and drug testing kits (r = .33). While positive harm reduction attitudes were higher, implementing corresponding behaviors proved more difficult. Stronger associations with high harm reduction behaviors included positive attitudes toward drug testing kits (odds ratio 4.53) and harm reduction interventions (odds ratio 4.06). Formal harm reduction policies and prevention programs are needed.
Ayahuasca use among ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Jews is adapted to Jewish contexts, with ceremonies modified to fit religious norms. Motivations for use are primarily therapeutic. Acute experiences include Jewish and Jewish mystical visionary content. Longer-term effects include strengthened belief, connection to Judaism, and changes in religious practice. Religious tensions arise from ayahuasca's perceived foreignness, concerns about idolatry, mixed-gender participation, and competing authority structures. Strategies to address these tensions include medicalization, making the set, setting, and experience religiously permissible ("koshering"), and framing ceremonies as liminal spaces. The findings highlight psychedelics' contextual flexibility and diffusion into understudied populations.