Oregon Lawmakers Advance Psilocybin Mushroom Bill
[dropcap class=”kp-dropcap”]T[/dropcap]he Oregon Psilocybin Society recently received a formal approval to get a ballot initiative on the 2020 ballot that would legalize psychedelic mushrooms for licensed therapists in the state. The bill would also reduce the penalties for the possession of psilocybin mushrooms.
Oregon’s Secretary of State Dennis Richardson approved language for the 2020 Psilocybin Service Initiative of Oregon according to a letter signed on Nov. 8. Organizers now need to collect 117,578 signatures in order to qualify for the 2020 ballot in Oregon.
“The intent of the 2020 Psilocybin Service Initiative of Oregon is to advance a breakthrough therapeutic model currently being perfected in research settings at top universities around the world. The service model involves a sequence of facilitated sessions, including assessment and preparation, psilocybin administration, and integration afterwards. We envision a community-based framework, where licensed providers, along with licensed producers of psilocybin mushrooms, blaze trails in Oregon in accordance with evolving practice standards,” the ballot initiatives authors Tom and Sheri Eckert wrote on an official campaign website.
Mushroom reform is happening in multiple states. Colorado and Oregon both pioneered recreational cannabis laws, and now they are on track to do the same with psychedelic mushrooms. In Denver, Colorado, similar efforts to legalize psilocybin mushrooms are underway. Advocates are gathering signatures to decriminalize penalties for psilocybin mushrooms for a municipal May 2019 ballot. An earlier effort to decriminalized psilocybin mushrooms in California failed.
Meanwhile, cannabis producer Tilray’s Peter Thiel is supporting an effort by Compass Pathways to develop psilocybin-based drugs for the treatment of depression. That experimental therapy received “breakthrough therapy” status from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. According to recent research, psilocybin mushrooms may be beneficial in treating alcoholism and end-of-life anxiety as well. In addition, researchers from John Hopkins University called for the mushrooms to be reclassified under Schedule IV of the Controlled Substances Act.
On the street, they’re called “shrooms” or “magic mushrooms,” but beyond inebriation, the mushrooms may prove to have a lot more medical applications than previously thought.
