SYCHEDELIC MEDICINE COALITION BUILDS OUT ADVOCACY FOOTPRINT: A coalition of advocates pushing for looser regulations governing the therapeutic use of psychedelic drugs is moving to build out its lobbying footprint in Washington. The Psychedelic Medicine Coalition hired its first federal lobbyists this month and also launched a political action committee to back lawmakers supportive of investing in research on psychedelic substances like ketamine, psilocybin — or mushrooms — and MDMA, or ecstasy, several of which are in various phases of clinical trials.
— The coalition has been around since 2021, when Melissa Lavasani launched the group after leading a successful campaign to decriminalize psychedelic mushrooms in D.C. The coalition hired The Conafay Group’s Darin Gardner — a one-time chief of staff to House Appropriations Chair Kay Granger (R-Texas) — and Josh Narrow to help with its push to fund psychedelics research, likely through the Department of Veterans Affairs or new advanced research agency ARPA-H.
— The emphasis on funding federal research into that class of psychedelic drugs, which like marijuana are classified federally as Schedule 1 substances with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse, is a conscious effort to avoid the pitfalls of the stalled marijuana legalization push, Lavasani told PI.
— “We need to get federal adoption of psychedelics as a legitimate medicine as a top priority, and taking a research and science based approach and ensuring that we can get the federal government to take first steps on psychedelics — it’s not going to be with decriminalization, that argument is really polarizing,” she said. “Really building that evidence, we believe it’s going to lead to better policy outcomes in the end.”
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https://www.politico.com/newsletters/politico-influence/2023/03/31/psychedelics-coalition-advocacy-00090008
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