In Australia, professor David Nutt is advocating for the use of regulatory-approved and evidence-based psychedelic-assisted therapies along with the nonprofit Mind Medicine Australia MMA. There is a ridiculous resistance to accepting the fact that psilocybin and MDMA are revolutionary treatments that should be available now to save people's lives. We now know that it works in a completely different way to traditional drugs because I've done a lot of research on how these drugs work, and how they affect depression with psilocybin, according to Nutt.
The Imperial College London professor is giving talks around the country, besides meeting with the Therapeutic Goods Administration TGA and federal health minister Mark Butler in Canberra earlier this week, as reported by The Canberra Times.
The administration, which is being requested to reschedule psychedelics for therapeutic purposes, has previously made an interim decision to reject the reclassification because of limited evidence of benefit from MDMA and psilocybin, but MMA hopes officials will change their minds.
The country s National Science Agency CSIRO and the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists are of the opinion that further research is needed to prove efficacy and safety of psychedelic-assisted therapies.
Victoria officials recently looked at the possibility of banning federal psychedelic medicine permits provided by the TGA.
The ACT government, which has now applied the TGA's special permits plan, is considering legislation changes for psychedelic therapy to be used in treatments of PTSD and depression.
Four years ago, Vanessa's husband, Franco, came down with a severe form of depression. She told The Canberra Times he was hospitalized several times for a total of 19 months during which time he was on 19 different antidepressants, anti-psychotics.
Her attempts to help her husband led her to the work of Prof. Nutt. Vanessa tried to get access to psychedelics for months, as well as finding a psychiatrist who was willing to try and get access to this treatment on compassionate grounds because otherwise I was losing my husband. Access to MDMA and psilocybin can be obtained on compassionate grounds, according to Vanessa. There is a paradox that none of the states will allow you to take psychedelics, despite the fact that they are available everywhere. Because I am a conscious citizen, I didn't want to break the law and in the end the consequences were that my husband took his own life, Vanessa said.
The case resounded, and Prof. Nutt stated that the decision to deny access to psychedelic medicine was criminal and sadistic. We're not talking about recreational use, we're talking about medical use in medical practice. It's almost inconceivable that there is going to be any harm in these drugs at all. He said that they should be available to help people like Vanessa's husband who has failed on all the other treatments that are more harmful to him than these treatments.