Effort builds to regulate mind-altering but legal herb

YOUNGSTOWN — Momentum is building in the effort to regulate a cheap Mexican sage that produces mind-altering effects.

At one time cocaine, ecstasy and heroin were legal in the United States, but eventually each was added to the government’s list of controlled substances. Now, there’s a push to regulate the herb Salvia Divinorum.

Salvia is a legal substance that resembles everyday sage, but the effects of smoking it are far more powerful than the household herb.

Hallucinations, vivid flashbacks and loss of muscle control have all been described as effects of salvia, said Rogene Waite, spokesperson at the Drug Enforcement Agency headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Read much more in Sunday’s Vindicator and Vindy.com