CANNABIS CULTURE – Magic Mushrooms have shown promise in treatment of addiction and depression. The question now is — will the psychedelic approach ever be legal?
Numinus just announced its plans to begin a compassionate access trial of psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy for substance use disorder. Dr. Evan Wood, Chief Medical Officer at Numinus had this to say in the announcement released today:

“Research has already demonstrated great promise for psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy as a treatment for certain substance use disorders. [ … ] But, psilocybin is still illegal in Canada. This compassionate access trial will begin to address the hurdle of public accessibility, while allowing us to evaluate service delivery models and study the impacts of psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy as an adjunct to standard of care treatments for substance use disorders.” 

There will initially be 30 participants for a specific type of psychedelic psychotherapy intervention with psilocybin geared toward treating persistent addictions. 

Numinus hopes to play a role in laying the regulatory groundwork for legal access to both MDMA and psilocybin; and the company’s aim with this study is to provide data about safety and outcomes for health regulators.

Drugs are winning big in 2020; but psilocybin, in particular, has been quickly slipping into the mainstream. TheraPsil, a non-profit based in Victoria, B.C., has been helping people who are experiencing severe end-of-life distress get compassionate use exemptions for therapeutic psilocybin since August. 

The US saw a wave of legalizations on Election Day, including magic mushrooms in Oregon; and a B.C. woman was just recently granted access to psilocybin to treat her unresolved trauma. 

In a statement quoted in a November 17th GrowthOp story, Mona Steleaff said, “For the first time, I feel like I have won the battle in my mind and my anxiety and depression seems to be gone. [ … ] The memories are not, but now I know they can’t hurt me.”

Feature image courtesy Numinus