The 2024 death of an American tourist during a psychedelic retreat in Costa Rica has drawn fresh international attention after the New York Times featured her case in a broader investigation into the risks Americans face when traveling abroad for unregulated psychedelic therapy.
Lauren Levis, a 40-year-old social worker from New Mexico, died in August 2024 after taking ibogaine during a retreat at Soul Centro, a facility in Paquera on the Nicoya Peninsula. Levis had first visited the retreat in October 2023 and returned the following August for a second session.
According to her family, the ceremony began in the evening and continued through the night. Her brother has said she was found unresponsive in a shower at the facility, and that the family struggled to reach anyone there in the hours afterward. She had reportedly paid roughly $4,000 (approximately ₡2,020,000) for the treatment, unaware that ibogaine is illegal under Costa Rican law.
The Judicial Investigation Organization in Nicoya spent nearly eight months investigating the case before sending its findings to local prosecutors in March 2025. Her death, along with a similar 2014 case involving a Norwegian woman who died at another ibogaine facility, helped expose the legal gray area that has allowed dozens of ayahuasca, iboga and ibogaine retreats to operate across Costa Rica largely outside government oversight, most of them run by foreign operators rather than Costa Ricans.
By one estimate, Costa Rica now hosts around 80 psychedelic retreat centers, roughly 60 of them offering ayahuasca alone, along with others focused on psilocybin mushrooms and ibogaine, making the country the second most popular destination worldwide for this kind of tourism after Peru. The largest operations, concentrated around Puntarenas and Tamarindo, can host up to 100 guests per session at around $5,000 (approximately ₡2,525,000) a person, running several retreats a month.
Celebrity visibility has helped fuel that growth. NFL quarterback Aaron Rodgers has attended multiple ayahuasca retreats in Costa Rica and South America and has spoken openly about the experience shaping his personal outlook. Fellow NFL player Adrian Colbert has described joining Rodgers on one such retreat in Costa Rica, crediting it with helping him move past anger.
Musician Machine Gun Kelly has said he traveled to Costa Rica for an ayahuasca ceremony with his then-fiancée, actress Megan Fox, who had prior experience with the substance. Fox’s public association with the country’s retreat scene became enough of a concern that a leaked memo from Costa Rica’s Ministry of Health specifically cited health claims being amplified by visiting celebrities like her as part of a broader push to potentially shut down several retreat centers.
Other public figures, including musician Sting and actors Lindsay Lohan and Jim Carrey, have spoken about ayahuasca experiences as well, though not always specifying Costa Rica as the location.
The Times investigation places the Levis case within a much wider pattern beyond the celebrity spotlight. Reporters interviewed more than two dozen patients and researchers and found that the industry, aimed largely at Americans who often travel abroad because these treatments remain illegal in the United States, operates with little consistency in medical screening, staffing or emergency preparedness.
A safety review published in the medical journal JAMA examined 49 retreats and clinics advertising publicly in the United States and other countries and found that fewer than half employed a medical professional, while only about one in ten had staff trained to handle emergencies.
The Times also documented a 2025 death at a psychedelic detox clinic in Mexico and the death of a 41-year-old building inspector from Alabama this past June after an ayahuasca ceremony at a retreat in Peru. Mexico in particular has seen a surge in psychedelic tourism businesses due to its proximity to the United States and looser regulation, with the Times identifying at least 40 clinics and wellness centers now offering ibogaine there, up from almost none a decade ago.
Ibogaine is derived from the root bark of a shrub native to Central Africa and produces a dreamlike, waking state that can last more than 24 hours. It has drawn interest for its apparent effectiveness against addiction and certain brain injuries, but it also carries a serious risk of fatal cardiac complications, meaning patients require close medical monitoring during treatment.
Some former patients told the Times that retreat centers failed to screen for preexisting health conditions, dispensed medications without reviewing a patient’s history, advised abrupt discontinuation of psychiatric medications, or tried to sell additional services to guests who were still under the influence of the substance.
Costa Rica’s Institute on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence has linked 569 deaths to psychoactive substance use in the country between 2014 and 2020, though that figure covers substance use broadly rather than psychedelic retreats specifically.
