Drug Science podcast #25: Treating addiction with psychedelics.

The Drug Science podcast series are pretty much all well worth listening to. #25 with Professor Matt Johnson from John Hopkins looks at recent work helping smokers stop with psilocybin-assisted therapy. The podcast description states: "Tobacco and alcohol are the largest sources of preventable death in the world. Our current treatments are only 15% effective at best. However, psilocybin-assisted therapy has achieved an astonishing 80% success rate in clinical trials. Professor Matthew Johnson is paving the way for this new an innovative treatment to address one of the most damaging social burdens of modern society, drug addiction. It is important to note that Professor Johnson’s research is not looking at casual habitual smokers, but instead, long-term, treatment resistant tobacco users.

Matthew W. Johnson, Ph.D., Professor at Johns Hopkins, has worked with psychedelics since 2004. He published psychedelic safety guidelines in 2008, the first psychedelic treatment of tobacco addiction in 2014, and with colleagues published the largest study of psilocybin in cancer distress in 2016. His 2018 psilocybin review recommended Schedule IV upon medical approval. He is Principal Investigator on upcoming psilocybin studies treating opioid addiction and PTSD, and LSD research treating chronic pain. Matt and the Johns Hopkins Psychedelic Research Unit are examining the long-term behavioural changes resulting from a single psilocybin session and cognitive behavioural therapy."