If you’re a regular reader here at Think Wilder then you might have noticed that I’ve slowed down a bit here on the blog over the past couple weeks, and that’s because I’ve had a lot going on in my personal life. Because of everything going on, I didn’t get around to publishing a link post for this story that broke earlier this month about the effort to reschedule psilocybin and MDMA in Australia to allow for therapeutic use. Psilocybin Alpha had the scoop:
On the 1st of September the nonprofit Mind Medicine Australia submitted a proposal to the Australian Therapeutic Goods Association (TGA), the regulatory body in charge of the island country’s drug scheduling. This proposal was submitted in hopes of reclassifying psilocybin and MDMA from prohibited substances to controlled medicines.
If this proposal is successful, Australia will become the first country in the world to reschedule these substances for therapeutic purposes, potentially giving thousands of people access to life-saving treatments, and setting a precedent that has the potential to influence global policy and attitudes towards psychedelics.
Mind Medicine Australia is requesting that people contact the TGA by September 28th to show their support. An interim decision on the proposal will be announced in February 2021 with a final decision occurring next April.
It would be pretty impressive if Australia ended up being the first country to legalize currently-illegal psychedelics like psilocybin and MDMA for therapeutic use. I certainly wasn’t expecting this—were you?