Massachusetts could become the third U.S. state to decriminalize psilocybin, the psychedelic drug found in mushrooms, if enough voters mark “yes” on their ballot’s Question 4.
Many drug policy researchers say legalization could be dangerous because more study is needed on the mind-altering compound in mushrooms.
Advocates say “magic mushrooms” can help those with mental health issues such as depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.
“The media and public hype is way beyond where the science is,” said Luke Niforatos, cofounder and executive vice president of the Foundation for Drug Policy Solutions. “If you really follow the data, where you have a lot of entrepreneurs who … with their ‘fake it till you make it’ sensibility, they claim [psilocybin] helps with everything. And then it turns out it doesn’t, and they’ve kind of screwed everyone who gets hurt along the way.”
The Massachusetts measure would allow people 21 and older to legally possess, use and cultivate five specific psychedelics derived from plants and fungi. Governing.com reports that the proposed measure would set up a tax system for psychedelic sales and establish a regulatory board overseeing licensed providers.
Voters are sharply divided. A University of Massachusetts Amherst poll shows 43% in favor and 43% opposed.
In a recent phase 2 trial, the largest of its kind, a single 25-milligram dose of synthetic psilocybin combined with psychotherapy led to a marked reduction in depression symptoms. The American Society of Microbiology said participants reported significantly greater improvements after three weeks compared with those given a low 1-milligram dose, offering hope for those trapped in cycles of treatment-resistant depression.
This kind of data underpinned Oregon and Colorado’s relatively recent moves to decriminalize psychedelics and the health centers using them to treat addiction, depression and other mental health issues.
Seattle, Santa Cruz, California, and the District of Columbia are among 26 jurisdictions that have listed psychedelic possession as the “lowest law enforcement priority.”
Mr. Niforatos is skeptical of the studies showing mushrooms as effective treatments. He said proof of real success takes time and the national results of marijuana legalization haven’t been pretty.
“So this all started, you know, 40 years ago, they were trying to get ballot measures. Advocates were trying to pass marijuana legalization, and the country didn’t, did not want that, so they came up with a brand new media campaign,” he said. “You know: ‘We’re going to call it medical marijuana as a red herring to get the public more likely to support marijuana.’ They called it ‘medical.’ They used cancer patients, they used veterans. They said that this is medicine.”
Mr. Niforatos said claims that marijuana is a miracle cure are lies.
“It’s hilarious because those same people now are saying we need psychedelics to cure everyone of PTSD and cancer and everything else, but those are the same people who said marijuana was going to do that,” he said.
The change in demeanor toward mushrooms has been relatively recent. More than 200 psilocybin trials are underway or will be soon, according to the National Library of Medicine. “Five years ago, you wouldn’t have found any,” David Nichols, a professor emeritus from Purdue University School of Pharmacy, told the American Society of Microbiology last year.
In 2018, the Food and Drug Administration took a significant step by granting psilocybin a special designation to accelerate research into its use as a treatment for depression. In the past few years, study after study has seemed to indicate that psilocybin could outpace the efficacy of medicines such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors in treating mental health issues.
While advocates tout the healing potential of these substances, critics warn that opening the floodgates without proper safeguards could lead to dangerous, unregulated chaos.
Charles Lehman, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute working on the Policing and Public Safety Initiative, said this increasingly galvanized push for legalization has two outcomes: one that protects users and one that doesn’t.
“On the FDA route, things are progressing in a direction that I like. You know, research is being done on the efficacy of these drugs and making judgments about the costs and benefits. And in that case, you know, we’re talking whether or not doctors should prescribe them, and you can describe what the regulatory system should look like after that,” he said.
Mr. Lehman said the pain point with psychedelic advocacy runs parallel to the political push. “Basically, [they’re saying] we should implement the medical marijuana model for these substances at the state level, which is where you end up with the non-FDA-approved, non-doctor-overseen availability of these substances,” he said.
That model exists in Oregon, Colorado and the District. If voters choose it on Tuesday, it will exist in Massachusetts.
“I think basically what you see in those situations is these relatively low-barrier, state legal marketplaces that are still pretty undersubscribed because most of what happens is this giant gray market pops up,” he said.
The “gray market” that Mr. Lehman describes is essentially a black market that conducts business in the light of day.
Because of their status as decriminalized substances, mushrooms are often sold openly in bricks-and-mortar shops and highly advertised on the street. From a legal standpoint, the loophole for shop owners is a minor obstacle.
Consumers usually are charged for an expensive but negligible “gift,” and the psychedelics they buy are thrown in “free.” Other delivery services have robust websites instead of shops. Consumers can have psychedelics delivered to their doors as long as they pay in cash.
Jacob Rich, a drug policy analyst at the libertarian think tank Reason Foundation, said it doesn’t make a difference whether people use the psychedelics sold to them, gray market notwithstanding.
Mr. Rich said the only good argument against mushrooms would question their effect on public health.
“From what I’ve seen, it’s a bunch of super-high-agency people using incredibly small amounts to self-diagnose something. Or maybe they take a lot occasionally and then they kind of have … a trip,” he said. “But you’re not going to go on a six-day binge or be addicted to mushrooms eventually. And so I don’t, I really don’t see that leading to any sort of negative mental health outcome publicly.”
Mr. Lehman disagrees, and he is not alone. The academic tides have shifted after years of the medical world’s rapid-onset interest in psilocybin’s mental health uses. Most of the concern stems from the threat of unregulated private use and private harm.
Dr. Joshua S. Siegel, a psychiatrist at Washington University in St. Louis, told The New York Times that patients with severe mental health conditions have become increasingly interested in trying more natural remedies.
Dr. Siegel said mushrooms are dangerous and destabilizing to those people, who are generally in great need of stability.
“People can partly or completely lose touch with reality and behave in irrational and potentially dangerous ways,” he said.
Gregg Mollenhauer, a Navy veteran in Florida, turned to psilocybin to cope with crippling depression and self-diagnosed PTSD, but he found a complicated path to peace.
“Everything talks to you louder when you’re on it,” he told The Washington Times, recounting moments of intense psychosis during his trips. “For people with bipolar, psilocybin can be risky. You go from feeling completely happy to completely miserable, and that’s a dangerous place to be.”
At times, Mr. Mollenhauer struggled to control his hallucinations, which led to irrational actions and moments of panic. During one recent trip, Mr. Mollenhauer trashed his small apartment.
“My mom kind of put it in perspective. I always would get migraines and say, ‘Well, enjoy the times you’re not sick,’” he said. “And mushrooms, I don’t know, kind of goes to your body, like physically, mentally and, like, spiritually, and just kind of ruffles it all up — and then you’re sick. But it’s like a forced, you know, controlled pain, if that makes sense.”
Mr. Mollenhauer found that mushrooms, in many ways, intensified his experiences with what he believes to be bipolar disorder, a condition he hoped mushrooms would alleviate.
“I believe psilocybin does put me in a state where I’m high … up and sad. Which, for bipolar, that’s a very risky place to be because that’s what causes the psychosis: You trying to make sense of being completely happy, about being completely miserable. And you can go manic,” he said.
On another trip, he said, he tried to touch electricity and eat glass as a result of a hallucination he experienced. “If I was in a controlled environment, I’m pretty sure none of that would [have] happened,” he said.
Despite these darker experiences, he said mushrooms helped him confront trauma he had long buried. He said he is getting to a more stable place the more he works with himself while using mushrooms, figuring out which dosage is best for a more calm and fruitful experience.
“I wouldn’t say I’m not suicidal,” Mr. Mollenhauer said. “I still have ideations, but I’ve been better able to cope. Psilocybin helps me reassociate feelings and emotions, and it slows down my mind.”
From 2018 to 2022, psilocybin-related calls to poison centers tripled among teens, from 152 to 464, and more than doubled among adults ages 20-25, from 125 to 294, according to data from the National Poison Data System.
This summer, a wave of illnesses struck nearly 160 people who consumed Diamond Shruumz gummies and chocolates from vape and smoke shops, reigniting the conversation surrounding the hidden dangers of unregulated, psychoactive substances. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention linked three deaths to these sweets, which contained illegal psilocybin from mushrooms.
Last year, an off-duty Alaska Airlines pilot accused of trying to bring down a plane midflight said he had consumed magic mushrooms before boarding, according to several reports.
Dan, a hotel manager in the suburbs of Knoxville, Tennessee, who declined to share his last name for privacy reasons, said psilocybin changed his life in the way advocate researchers seem to believe it can.
Dan called himself “one of the lost causes” before he took 3 grams of psychedelic mushrooms with a friend. He has since received a promotion at work and has been eating well and exercising six days a week.
For 15 years, Dan did what he describes as “every drug under the sun.” It started as an addiction to OxyContin after a car crash in New Orleans left him in dire need of surgery. The addiction spiraled into a debilitating dependence on fentanyl and heroin. Dan said he overdosed 10 or 11 times.
He said he hasn’t overdosed since he stumbled upon psilocybin. He said he hasn’t touched a drug and hasn’t felt the need to.
“One day, I was trying to have a good time and I found something that changed my life,” Dan told The Washington Times.
The Reason Foundation’s Mr. Rich said the regularly cited evidence of health benefits from mushrooms is insufficient and that regular psilocybin use has not been studied long enough to reach firm conclusions on their efficacy in treating mental health.
Indeed, psilocybin remains classified as a Schedule 1 drug, meaning it has “high abuse potential with no accepted medical use,” according to the National Institutes of Health. “Medications within this schedule may not be prescribed, dispensed, or administered.”
The state legal systems considering loosening psychedelic restrictions aren’t thinking about the matter of control nearly enough, Mr. Lehman said.
Mr. Niforatos said more time is needed before Massachusetts and other states consider broad legalization.
“Look, it’s definitely not a foregone conclusion that these substances are just like the medical panacea or even that they’re efficacious,” he said. “Because right now, the data are so inconsistent, and the studies that are found finding promise are a few and far between, as well as not always the best quality data.”
For Dan, the question of control or legalization isn’t complicated. He said everyone should have access to what he deems a “miracle.”
• Emma Ayers can be reached at eayers@washingtontimes.com.
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