Exploring new data on the safety of psychedelics

Prior to his confirmation, the new head of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., indicated he wanted sweeping reforms to federal drug policy and was “open” to improving access to psychedelics. Among the most promising reforms on the table is the potential reclassification of psilocybin, the active compound in “magic mushrooms,” from its current status as a Schedule I substance banned under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA).

Under the CSA, Schedule I substances are defined as drugs with “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.” This classification places psilocybin in the same category as heroin and LSD, despite growing evidence that it may be neither as dangerous nor devoid of medical value as the law suggests. Does the evidence support maintaining psilocybin in this restrictive category?

To provide info that may help answer this question, Reason Foundation’s drug policy team collected and analyzed data on how crime, hospitalization, and adverse events impact measurable public health outcomes. The data is now publicly available through Reason Foundation’s recently published psychedelics dashboard.

Using this dashboard, we can gain a clearer picture of how psilocybin access is affecting communities and assess if the evidence supports the continued classification of psilocybin as a drug that threatens public health and lacks medical value.

Let’s first look at public health, using Colorado as a case study. In 2022, Colorado became the first state to legalize the personal possession of small amounts of psilocybin through Proposition 122 in 2022.

According to our dashboard, hallucinogen-related crimes in Colorado have been on a general downward trend since 2019, despite a brief uptick in 2021. In 2020, there were 437 total hallucinogen-related crimes. In 2023, the first full year after legalization, there were 295.

In 2022, hallucinogen-related hospitalizations represented 0.4% of drug and alcohol-related incidents in Colorado. By 2023, that number fell to 0.3%.

A representative from the Denver police department confirmed in 2023 (and reaffirmed in 2024) that psilocybin has not been a significant law enforcement issue, either before or after Proposition 122.

Similar trends are observed in other states, like California and Massachusetts, where the dashboard shows no significant public health threats linked to psilocybin use. Unlike the entire state of Colorado, California and Massachusetts only have a few isolated jurisdictions that have attempted to deprioritize law enforcement of psychedelics (“decriminalization”).

Cannabis provides a useful comparison to gauge the appropriateness of reclassifying psilocybin. In 2024, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recommended that cannabis be removed from Schedule I, citing public health data that showed it did not represent a significant threat to public health.

While Reason Foundation’s dashboard focuses on psychedelics, it also includes proprietary data from the Colorado Hospital Association, which tracks both cannabis- and hallucinogen-related hospitalizations. In Colorado, where both hallucinogens and cannabis are legal to possess, cannabis accounted for 11% of drug- and alcohol-related hospitalizations in 2023, while hallucinogens accounted for just 0.4% in that same year.

If we use the HHS cannabis recommendation as criteria for comparing scheduling of a botanical drug, then hallucinogens–with an even lower rate of hospitalization and crime–might also meet the same safety criteria.

”Accepted medical use” is another factor in the federal government’s classification of drugs. While scientific research is not something we collected for our dashboard, it is worth noting here that there is also a growing body of evidence suggesting that psilocybin has significant medical value. The Food and Drug Administration, for example, has granted “breakthrough therapy” status to multiple synthetic analogs of psilocybin currently undergoing clinical trials to treat a number of illnesses, including depression. Breakthrough status is given to compounds where preliminary clinical evidence demonstrates their extraordinary promise to accelerate research and development.

One meta-analysis of various studies found strong evidence that psilocybin was superior in treating depression psilocybin was superior in the treatment of depression compared to traditional psychotherapy. Other research highlights its potential in treating anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and addiction.

There is now ample evidence for the new administration to evaluate if and how to classify the risk profile of botanical psychedelic compounds.

Want to dive deeper into the numbers? Visit Reason Foundation’s psychedelics data dashboard here.

The post Exploring new data on the safety of psychedelics appeared first on Reason Foundation.

Source: https://reason.org/commentary/exploring-new-data-on-the-safety-of-psychedelics/