The Potential of Psychedelics

5min Snip

00:00

Play full episode

Summary

Transcript

Episode notes

There's a lot of excitement around psychedelics at the moment, isn't that mean? I guess not least because existing drugs for these kinds of conditions don't seem to work very well in many patients and we haven't really had any new drugs for a long while. And seeing these drugs work with some people, they can have very transformative effects, but most of them are still at a relatively early stage. We need longer trials and bigger trials, really, to look at that. The idea that people are having a miracle cure can be quite damaging for patients.

Psychedelic drugs have long been been used for their mind-altering effects. Now, they are making their way into western medicine as a treatment for mental health disorders. From July, psychiatrists in Australia will be able to prescribe MDMA for post-traumatic stress disorder, making it the first country in the world to recognise psychedelics as medicines. The US could soon follow, with plans for the US Food and Drug Administration to be asked for approval to treat PTSD with MDMA this year. Ian Sample speaks to correspondent Hannah Devlin about how the science behind psychedelic therapy has progressed, and hears from Prof Celia Morgan about what treatment is actually like, what we know about the risks and what’s left to learn. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/sciencepod