Using psychedelic substances is nothing new. In fact, psychedelics have their roots in ancient culture where the super or ‘magical’ mushrooms from which they are derived were worshipped. In the 1950s and ‘60s, there were a number of people experimenting with them for recreational purposes, and for treating alcoholism and other conditions, mainly in informal situations.
And although the more formal trials were many (more than 40,000 people took part in them), they weren’t of the same standard that the FDA approval process currently requires. Additionally, their association with the counterculture led to their condemnation and stigmatization.
By 1968, LSD was banned in all states and with the passing of the Controlled Substances Act in 1970, there was also pressure on psilocybin, the safest psychedelic so far, because of limited accepted evidence of its efficacy and its potential for abuse. This meant that institutional funding for research wasn’t available and it was left to individual donors to take it forward.
In 2004, the University of California (UCLA) started clinical trials of psilocybin on advanced-stage cancer patients with pain, anxiety and depression. In 2006, Johns Hopkins University, which has been researching psilocybin since the 1970s, issued a publication that led to the establishment of a separate research unit for the purpose. In 2020, the university established the Center for Psychedelic & Consciousness Research that has published over 27,000 articles on psychedelic drugs, including a thousand on psilocybin, the most-researched psychedelic substance.
Pharma companies also tasted some success around then. In 2018-2019, two companies, Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) and Compass Pathways (CMPS), got FDA approval for their therapeutics for treatment-resistant depression. JNJ’s Spravato was a ketamine analog while Compass’s was a psilocybin treatment. The interest in alternatives has increased over the past decade as existing lines of research aren’t yielding the desired results.
In fact, 30% of depression patients don’t respond to currently available treatments. Companies have dramatically reduced their research budgets in these areas. So most of the nearly 550 grants received for psilocybin research have been for its efficacy in treating mood and anxiety disorders such as cancer-related psychiatric distress.
But the current level of excitement is partly related to the recent funding that Johns Hopkins has received from the National Institute of Health’s (NIH) National Institute on Drug Abuse to research its ability to get long-time smokers off the habit.
Johns Hopkins did a clinical study on psilocybin back in 2014 and found remarkable success. The drug was given in 2 to 3 sessions, the first being on the date the subject quit smoking; the second was two weeks after that and the optional third one was after eight weeks.
Before administering, the patient was put on a couch with dark glasses and music…