A committee in the New Hampshire House of Representative is expected to vote next week on a bill that would legalize the therapeutic use of certain psychedelics.
Dried psilocybin mushrooms (left), mescaline (middle), and LSD (right). All three would be legalized for therapeutic use if House Bill 1693 is passed into law.
House Bill 1693, filed in December by State Representative Kevin Verville (R), would require the Department of Health and Human Services to create and administer a new program regulating the use of psychedelics for therapeutic purposes. The bill models the proposed statute after the state’s law that established the use of cannabis for therapeutic purposes.
The New Hampshire House Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs has scheduled to an executive session on the bill for October 9 at 1pm. Executive session are generally only held when a committee is expected to take a vote on a particular measure.
According to an official legislative summary, the bill:
• Legalizes the therapeutic use of psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), and mescaline, by removing criminal penalties for those with a “qualifying medical condition” (listed below).
• Legalizes “Alternative treatment center”, which are not-for-profit entities that are allowed to “acquire, possesses, cultivates, manufactures, delivers, transfers, transports, sells, supplies, and dispenses psychedelics, and related supplies and educational materials, to qualifying patients, designated caregivers, other alternative treatment centers, and visiting qualifying patients”.
• Establishes processes for applying for and issuing registry ID cards to patients and their caregivers.
• Establishes a confidential registry of patients, and their caregivers and providers, to be maintained by the Department.
• Establishes processes for applying for and issuing registrations to be an alternative treatment center (ATC) for the cultivation, production, and dispensing of psychedelics to patients.
• Requires the Department to issue an annual data report on the therapeutic use of psychedelics.
As with the use of cannabis for therapeutic purposes program, the new program is designed to be revenue neutral, with a fee structure for patients and alternative treatment centers that shall “generate revenues sufficient to offset all department expenses of implementing and administering this chapter.”
“Qualifying medical condition” includes:
(a) Anxiety.
(b) Depression.
(c) Panic disorder.
(d) Obsessive-compulsive disorder.
(e) Post-traumatic stress.
(f) Social anxiety.
(g) Body dysmorphia.
(h) Anorexia nervosa.
(i) Eating disorders.
(j) Substance use disorder.
(k) Sleep disorders.
(l) Insomnia.
(m) Personality disorder.
(n) Attention deficit.
(o) Chronic pain.
(p) Migraines and cluster headaches.
(q) Postpartum mental illnesses.
(r) Any novel or emergent mental illness which is not categorized in the Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders but is diagnosed by a state licensed mental health
professional, and so long as any efficacy, including self-reports, of Psilocybin has been observed in a
study published in a medical or scientific journal, including preprint servers
The full text of the measure can be found by clicking here.
