Psychedelic drug

• A recent report from Insight Ace Analytic projected that the Psychedelic Therapeutics Market Size is valued at 3.94 Billion in 2022 and is predicted to reach 13.29 Billion by the year 2031 at a 14.92 % CAGR during the forecast period for 2023-2031.
• The report said: "The Global psychedelic therapeutics market is proliferating owing to the increasing incidence of depression cases across the world.
• Additionally, changed lifestyles and quality of living are supporting the growth of psychedelic medicine market.
• Worldwide has a track record of successful patient recruitment for psychedelic trials and global relationships with best-in-class investigative sites.

• Whether seeing the world through the eyes of a toad is an experience worth having is an open question.
• Toad juice (or bufotenine, its active ingredient) is currently experiencing a renaissance, albeit usually in smokable form.
• Mike Tyson, Hunter Biden and Joe Rogan credit it with life-changing insights that years of amphibian-free therapy could not provide.
• Review: Psychonauts: Drugs and the Making of the Modern Mind – Mike Jay (Yale University Press) Psychedelics are back in the news.

The early psychonauts

• Jay excavates a much deeper and more interesting history of early chemical adventurers.
• In the 1880s, for example, Sigmund Freud self-administered cocaine to test whether it could induce euphoria and recharge the cerebral battery as earlier psychonauts had suggested.
• Chastened by his colleague’s descent into a vortex of abuse, he set cocaine aside and airbrushed it from his life story.
• Read more:
  Friday essay: peyotes in suburbia – the secret world of Sydney's psychoactive cacti growers

Substances and society

• Much of Jay’s book lays out an absorbing history of psychoactive substances, but it is also rich with insights on the broader societal implications of substance use.
• Once an expansive category, it contracted when “medications” escaped into therapeutic legitimacy, leaving the remaining substances stigmatised and criminalised.
• More recently, psychedelics have attempted the same manoeuvre, trying to shed the taint of abused drugs to become seen as morally impeccable.
• Psychedelics have been stereotypically whiter than the substances against which the American war on drugs has primarily been fought, disproportionately targeting minority communities as a result.

Psychonautics and psychology

• Many early psychonauts were artists, writers and philosophers, but influential psychologists and neurologists were also well represented, notably Freud, James and, decades later, Harvard psychology professor Timothy Leary, a buttoned-down academic researcher before he turned on, tuned in and dropped out.
• These three writers all found inspiration in their experiences of intoxication, although Freud backed away from his own.
• Their explorations were supported by approaches to psychology that centred the study of subjectivity.
• William James worked at a time when subjective experience was central to the nascent field of academic psychology.
• New psychoactive substances – such as amphetamines, ecstasy and LSD – were synthesised during this period, but the tradition of self-experimentation had died within psychology.

• Cybin Inc. (NEO:CYBN) (NYSE American:CYBN) (“Cybin” or the “Company”), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company committed to revolutionizing mental healthcare by developing new and innovative psychedelic-based treatment options, is pleased to announce that Doug Drysdale, Cybin’s Chief Executive Officer, and Allison House-Gecewicz, Cybin’s SVP of Clinical Operations, will be speaking at the Psychedelic Science 2023 Conference hosted the by Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), taking place June 19-23, 2023 in Denver, Colorado.
• The details are as follows:
  Mr. Drysdale will speak in a panel discussion titled “Laying the foundation for a new ecosystem” on Wednesday, June 21, 2023, at 12:00 p.m. MT.
• Ms. House-Gecewicz will speak at the Psychedelic Drug Pipeline Briefing Breakfast taking place on Thursday, June 22, 2023, at 8:00 a.m. MT.
• “We are honored and excited to be speaking at one of the world’s largest conferences on psychedelic healthcare,” said Doug Drysdale, Chief Executive Officer of Cybin.

• BALTIMORE, June 20, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- The Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic & Consciousness Research (CPRC) has announced the appointment of Frederick S. Barrett, PhD, as its new Director, effective immediately.
• He has been conducting psychedelic research at Johns Hopkins University since 2013.
• Johns Hopkins Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Director, James B. Potash, MD, MPH, said, "I couldn't be more pleased to welcome Dr. Barrett to this critically important role as the CPCR's new Director.
• I am confident he will drive the CPCR to continued success as a world leader in psychedelic research."