The full House of Representatives for the United States has given approval to amendments that would facilitate the research of psychedelic substances.
The amendments were approved as part of a larger federal spending bill that covers the Department of Defense, and were approved in a voice vote.
The first amendment, filed by Representatives Morgan Luttrell and Dan Crenshaw (both Republicans from Texas), would allocate $15 million for the Department of Defense to conduct “Psychedelic Medical Clinical Trials”. A second amendment filed without Representative Luttrell would establish some parameters for this research, declaring that it should include active duty service members who have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or a traumatic brain injury.
The amendments would require the Department of Defense to conduct a report for Congress based on the results of the trials.
“[I can] personally attest to the benefits in treating post-traumatic stress, traumatic brain injury and chronic traumatic encephalopathy through the use of psychedelic substances”, said Rep. Luttrell, a military veteran
Lutrell says that there’s a stigma among House members that “I believe stems from a lack of education experience around the clinical use of plant-based, or psychedelic, medications”.
“Unfortunately, the stigma has led to the slow or no adoption of medical procedures that may have saved countless lives, and our service members, veterans and first responders”, he says. “It is our duty to explore all options when the lives of our nation’s most precious resources our sons, our daughters, our mothers, our fathers, brothers and sisters are at stake.”
Rep. Crenshaw called this a simple “yet important step”.
“There is no reason that we should not be looking into the benefits of this research for our men and women that are already currently serving our country actively”, he said. “It’s about honoring our promise to our military families and confronting the high incidence of suicide in the military and veteran community.”
Crenshaw continued; “So I unapologetically support this research. We shouldn’t think twice about. We owe this to our service members. We owe it to their families. And this is a really small but a positive step in the right direction.”
Reforming psychedelic laws has been gaining momentum in recent years. Oregon and Colorado have legalized certain psychedelics, and a bill to do the same was recently sent to the desk of California Governor Gavin Newsom.
