Scottsdale researchers celebrate Trump’s order on psychedelic medicine – AZ Family

SCOTTSDALE, AZ (AZFamily/AP) — Valley advocates are praising President Trump’s weekend executive order that fast tracks psychedelic medicine to treat certain medical conditions.
“Being able to expedite their research finally is going to bring us to the point where we can legally make these medicines available,” said Dr. Sue Sisley, who runs the lab at Scottsdale Research Institute, the only lab cleared by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to grow psilocybin mushrooms, not synthetics.
Sisley said her team has been working with the White House since April last year to make the executive order happen.
Trump signed the executive order Saturday that speeds up reviews of certain psychedelic drugs, including ibogaine, for everything from post-traumatic stress disorder to addiction and depression.
It also invests $50 million in illegal psychedelics like so-called magic mushrooms and ibogaine.
“It was thrilling because this is finally a path to healing for so many people: our military veterans, our first responders. There are so many lives that we think we are going to be able to save with these types of medicines,” Sisley said.
The Scottsdale Research Institute is in the middle of the first clinical trial in the world using whole psilocybin mushrooms to treat veterans, firefighters and police officers diagnosed with PTSD.
“These first responders and veterans are reporting some truly extraordinary, transformative experiences just with our psilocybin mushrooms,” Sisley said.
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Sisley said her team is in the running for a $5 million state-funded clinical trial on using ibogaine to treat people with PTSD and traumatic brain injuries. That would also be the first in the country.
Sisley said she’s grateful for the new executive order, which is bringing patients hope, but she is a little skeptical that the DEA won’t drag its feet.
“This could take years to implement,” she said. “That is why we want to build on the momentum from the Saturday signing and start having negotiations with the DEA to get them on board quickly.”
The Food and Drug Administration will issue national priority vouchers next week for three psychedelics.
The vouchers can cut review times from several months to a period of weeks. It is the first time the FDA has offered fast-tracking to any psychedelics.
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