CANNANNEW REPORT

Chances are that psilocybin or magic mushrooms will be more widely legalized within several years. The progress they have made since 2020 has been extraordinary.  The path from illegality to legality looks remarkably like the journey that cannabis has been on for the last several years. As public sentiment has changed—driven in large part by anecdotal accounts of psilocybin's effectiveness as a treatment for PTSD as well as treatment-resistant depression and anxiety—several jurisdictions have begun removing barriers to psilocybin use through deprioritization, decriminalization, and full legalization. As with cannabis, though, these local actions are complicated by psilocybin's federal status as an illegal Schedule I drug. While it's worth asking when and how psilocybin could be legalized, that's somewhat of a backward question. The better question might be: why exactly is psilocybin illegal in the first place? Why Is Psilocybin Federally Illegal? There's a simple answer, and then there's the more complicated truth that underlies that simple answer. First, the straightforward part: psilocybin and psilocin—the active hallucinogenic substance from mushrooms native to South America, Mexico, and the southern U.S.—are federally illegal because they were classified as Schedule I substances under the Controlled Substances Act in 1970. That categorization is based on the three Schedule I criteria: drugs with no currently accepted medical use in the United States, drugs with a "high potential for abuse," and drugs that lack "accepted safety" for use under medical supervision. What differentiates Schedule I drugs from every other schedule is the lack of an "accepted medical use." Highly addictive but useful drugs such as cocaine, morphine, codeine, and fentanyl are all classified as Schedule II. Because they lack that apparent utility, Schedule I drugs are tightly controlled, which makes research—including, say, research into whether a drug might be medically useful—incredibly difficult. (If this sounds familiar, it's because there's another plant-based drug that's earned…

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Source : Psilocybin: Following in the Footsteps of Cannabis Along the Path to Legality

reposted by Cannabis News World