The FDA Just Approved PayPal Founder’s Project to Use Magic Mushrooms to Treat Depression

 

This week, it was announced that a startup called Compass Pathways  has received approval from The Food and Drug Administration to develop  treatments for depression, and possibly even pharmaceuticals, with psilocybin, the active ingredient in psychedelic “magic mushrooms.” Compass Pathways launched in the UK in 2016, thanks to funding from  Peter Thiel. 

While the company is just now receiving approval to run  trials in the US, they were already approved in Canada, the Netherlands  and their base of operations in the UK. 

According to the company’s website,  the trials will take place across 15 different sites throughout Europe  and North America, and will involve 216 participants. The tests are  expected to begin in the UK by the end of August. 

“This summer we are beginning a randomised controlled trial of  psilocybin therapy for treatment-resistant depression. This will be the  largest clinical study of its kind and will take place in a number of  clinical trial sites across Europe. The trial is a phase IIb  dose-ranging study with 216 patients. If successful, it will be followed  by phase III studies in which we will look at comparing the optimal  dose, mostly likely to placebo or standard of care,” a statement from the company said. George Goldsmith, chairman, and co-founder of Compass Pathways told FoxBusiness that these trials will help his team learn exactly how they can use psilocybin to treat depression. 

“Depression is the leading cause of ill-health and disability  worldwide, and treatment-resistant depression affects more than 100  million people. It is a huge unmet need and the trial will teach us more  about how this new approach might address it,” Goldsmith said. 

These trials will undoubtedly add to the wave of psychedelic studies  that are being carried about by a growing number of brave researchers. 

A report in The Journal of Psychopharmacology suggested  that psilocybin mushrooms could help long-time smokers kick their  habit. The report sourced a recent John Hopkins study, authored by  Matthew W. Johnson, an associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral  sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. The study  featured a small test sample but is one of a series of studies that are  showing the healing powers of psychedelic compounds. In 2012, John Hopkins made news in psychedelic research with a study showing that the psychedelic experience can help terminally ill patients come to terms with their own mortality. According to a new study from the Psychedelic Research Group at Imperial College London, published in the journal Psychopharmacology,  psychedelic mushrooms tend to make people more resistant to authority.  They also found the psychedelic experience induced by these mushrooms  also cause people to be more connected with nature. 

In another recent study,  researchers at the University of Zurich dosed 24 people with 100  micrograms of LSD and essentially found that these test subjects  experienced a diminishing of their ego and reported that they felt more  connected to the people around them. Prior research has also indicated that Theil’s bet on psychedelic therapy for depression could pay off big. 

These possibilities have also been explored by a team of researchers  from The University of North Carolina, Stanford University and the  University of California, who determined that LSD could, in fact, be  used to treat schizophrenia and depression. 

The researchers used a process known as crystallography, in which  atomic and molecular structure of certain interactions are studied. Specifically, the researchers were able to discover how LSD molecules  interact with the serotonin receptors in our brain. Researchers plan on  using this knowledge to develop an LSD based treatment for people with  schizophrenia.