Atlanta could add psilocybin and ketamine to city workers’ health plans pending resolution

A new proposal from an Atlanta City Council member would direct city officials to explore the pros and cons of adding coverage for psilocybin and ketamine as mental health treatments to the city’s health plan. city ​​for firefighters, police and other officials.

“Traditional treatments for mental illnesses such as depression, anxiety, PTSD and others have shown limited effectiveness for some people, leading to the need to explore alternative treatment options,” the study says. legislation, currently sponsored by 11 of the Council’s 16 members. , States. “Recent research has demonstrated the potential effectiveness of alternative therapies such as ketamine-assisted therapy and psilocybin-assisted therapy in the treatment of various mental health conditions, offering promising results where other treatments have failed . »

The resolution’s lead sponsor, Councilor Liliana Bakhtiari, said city workers deserve access to a wide range of mental health services.

“We should offer our employees — and especially our first responders, who are supposed to be superhuman — the same grace and provide them with a set of tools to essentially overcome this problem,” the lawmaker recently told Axios.

Bakhtiari said the impetus for including the medications in public servants’ health plans was meeting a West Virginia police officer who witnessed a colleague commit suicide and later used ketamine to treat his PTSD. The lawmaker said that to his knowledge, no other municipal government has considered covering psilocybin or ketamine treatment.

Bakhtiari’s resolution would direct Atlanta’s human resources department to “explore the feasibility of adding coverage for ketamine therapy, psilocybin therapy and other alternative therapies for mental illness in the health contract.” ‘social benefits of the city in its next round of negotiations’.

The city’s human resources department would further be asked to “conduct a thorough review of scientific evidence, safety considerations, regulatory landscape, liability, financial implications and applicability based on classification of employment to incorporate such alternative therapies as part of the employee’s benefits package. »

The findings of the review are expected to be submitted to the city council by Dec. 10 of this year.

Nearly two years ago, Atlanta leaders considered a separate measure filed by Bakhtiari to locally decriminalize a wide range of psychedelics, including plants, mushrooms, spores and other botanical compounds, although the measure was ultimately not adopted.

That same year, a Georgia House committee met at the state level to separately discuss the therapeutic potential of psychedelics like psilocybin to treat serious mental health issues that commonly afflict veterans.

As for workplace coverage of substances like psilocybin and ketamine, there is growing interest among employers and health care companies.

The nonprofit Enthea, which bills itself as “the first and only approved provider of psychedelic health plans,” announced last year that it would cover both ketamine treatment nationwide and psilocybin in states where it is permitted.

Enthea has previously worked with soap company Dr. Bronner’s to offer psychedelic-assisted therapy to workers through their health plans.

“We have been monitoring the potential benefits of psilocybin therapy since we founded our company,” Dan Rome, co-founder and chief medical officer of Enthea, said late last year. “We are very encouraged by the published results as well as what we are hearing from practicing therapists, and we are confident that this provides an important new option to combat mental illness. »

Enthea previously said its services would further expand to include therapies containing other substances, such as MDMA, “as they become approved.”

Meanwhile, at the federal level, a senior US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) official said earlier this month that there was an “unstoppable narrative” for advancements in psychedelic medicine, with a combination of compelling personal stories of healing and solid clinical data from studies he hopes to expand upon. He also said bipartisan acceptance of psychedelics has “surpassed” that of marijuana in Congress.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is currently considering a new drug application for MDMA-assisted therapy for the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The review has been granted priority status and a public hearing is scheduled for next month.

Although MDMA and psilocybin remain Schedule I controlled substances, both have also been granted “breakthrough therapy” status by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The House Veterans Affairs Committee also passed a bill earlier this month that would require VA to notify Congress if psychedelics are added to its list of covered prescription drugs.

President Joe Biden also signed into law a bipartisan measure to provide funding to the Department of Defense (DOD) to conduct clinical trials on the therapeutic potential of certain psychedelics for active-duty military personnel. This was enacted under the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of 2024.

In March, congressional appropriations officials also unveiled a spending package that included language providing $10 million to facilitate studies of psychedelics.

In January, VA separately issued a request for applications to conduct in-depth research into the use of psychedelics to treat PTSD and depression. And in October, VA launched a new podcast about the future of healthcare for veterans, and the first episode of the series focuses on the healing potential of psychedelics.

FDA officials also recently joined scientists at a public meeting on the next steps in research aimed at developing psychedelic drugs.

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Photo courtesy of Wikimedia/Workman.