NOW: White House Greenlights Psychedelic Therapies for Mental Health Disorders
Updated
A historic shift in the field of mental health has just happened. Decades of failed therapies mixed with dangerous and ineffective pharmaceutical drugs have just been met with a disruptive event with far-reaching significance.
A new Executive Order from the White House reads:
“Psychedelic drugs, including ibogaine compounds, show potential in clinical studies to address serious mental illnesses for patients whose conditions persist after completing standard therapy. Indeed, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted Breakthrough Therapy designation to specific psychedelic drugs, and there are numerous products currently in the clinical trial pipeline for review of safety and efficacy. It is the policy of my Administration to accelerate innovative research models and appropriate drug approvals to increase access to psychedelic drugs that could save lives and reverse the crisis of serious mental illness in America.”
Ibogaine was first used by members of the Bwiti religion in African nations like Gabon during their religious ceremonies.
In recent years, U.S. veterans have reported benefiting from the drug after traveling to clinics in Mexico that administer it. AP writes:
“The Food and Drug Administration next week will issue national priority vouchers for three psychedelics, which the agency’s commissioner, Marty Makary, said will allow certain drugs to be approved quickly “if they are in line with our national priorities.” The vouchers can cut review times from several months to a period of weeks. It is the first time the FDA has offered that fast-tracking to any psychedelics.”
The FDA is also taking steps to clear the way for the first-ever human trials of ibogaine in the U.S.
Why is this being seen as controversial by some? The historical American view of these therapies has been shaped by underhanded political maneuvering and inaccurate portrayals to the detriment of those who have needed real help.
“…counterculture’s embrace of psychedelics, led to a perception shift — from a tool for scientific exploration to a dangerous societal threat.
President Nixon, dogged by the increasing unpopularity of the Vietnam War, was all too happy to find a zeitgeist culprit. The psychedelic party came to a screeching halt in the early ’70s. The Controlled Substances Act of 1970 lumped LSD and psilocybin with heroin and cocaine, effectively shutting down legitimate research. With counterculture movements scapegoated and psychedelics seen as a societal menace, the scientific community’s promising exploration of these substances became an afterthought.”
Nixon aide John Ehrlichman later admitted that the War on Drugs, which launched with the (CSA), was designed to destroy the administration’s political enemies.
“We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and Blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities,” Ehrlichman told Harper’s Magazine in 1994.
Shutting down these therapies and stunting research for over 50 years because of the inhuman political maneuvering of one administration has had devastating consequences.
Suicide rates increased by 37 percent from 2000 to 2018.
Present at the President’s White House Executive Order Signing was HHS Secretary Kennedy who was an early advocated to plant medicine, stating:
“More than 6,000 [veterans] die by suicide each year since 2001. We have lost far more veterans to suicide than to combat. At the same time million of Americans living with depression, PTSD, addiction and other conditions do not respond to existing treatments.”
The failed Covid kicked off a further mental health crisis. Authors of the Great Barrington Declaration warned, against great political attacks, in October of 2020 the following:
“As infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists we have grave concerns about the damaging physical and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies…”
The White House Executive Orders further admits:
“Veterans often suffer in greater measure from this tragedy. For over 20 years, there have been more than 6,000 veteran suicides per year, and the current veteran suicide rate is more than twice as much as the non-veteran adult population.”
America is, and has been, facing a massive mental health challenge. The tools which Big Pharma has offered have come with dangerous harms and over-exaggerated benefits. Plant medicines offer a possible off-ramp to the raging mental health crisis many feel trapped in.
For my recent documentary on the mental health crisis, I was fortunate enough to interview Carlos Tanner, founder and director of the Ayahuasca Foundation.
WATCH DOCUMENTARY AT HIGHWIRE+
Speaking exclusively to The HighWire regarding today’s Executive Order, Carlos Tanner stated:
Today’s directive is an incredible opportunity to deepen our understanding of these sacred medicines that have been used by indigenous tribes for generations and a big step closer to the paradigm shift needed for Western culture.
As the American medical and scientific community evolve their understanding of these healing modalities my hope is that they honor and incorporate the ancestral wisdom and spiritual practice that brought these plant medicine traditions to our awareness.”
Since 2016, his foundation has hosted research investigating the effects of attending an ayahuasca retreat in the Amazon to treat depression, anxiety, and trauma. This research has been conducted by our research partner, Onaya Science, and over a dozen articles have been published demonstrated the incredible outcomes of the studies. It is clear that attending an ayahuasca retreat at our center greatly reduces depression and anxiety and improves overall health and well being.
In 2023, the foundation teamed up with Heroic Hearts project to host research looking specifically at the treatment of PTSD in military veterans. This research has also observed amazing results.