The impact of drug control on wider research: Psychedelic mushroom exploration

Abstract

Laws to control drugs have been progressively introduced since the early twentieth century to reduce non-medical use and drug-associated harm. Restrictions on what are now deemed ‘controlled drugs’ and, in New Zealand, ‘prohibited plants’ unjustly impact both medical care and research. The impact on research has frequently been cited in reference to the use of drugs in clinical research, such as the use of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) and psychedelic drugs (lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), psilocybin, and n,n-dimethyltryptamine (DMT)). The complexities and legal requirements involved in their use, or simply the inability to legally access these drugs at all, has limited research for decades. While restrictions on research into the clinical applications of these drugs have been commonly reported, legal restrictions also inhibit or severely restrict other research areas. This short paper describes the impedance that drug law can have on research in non-clinical areas, with a discussion of the impact of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975 on research of mushroom-forming fungi in New Zealand.

Introduction

Numerous plant and fungal species globally have been deemed ‘controlled drugs’ by legislation. This has inadvertently resulted in decades of global inhibition of research into respective species ecology, natural products, and conservation. Controlled drugs legislation inhibits research by hindering access to prohibited species and controlled drugs, as well as access to compounds and species not yet known to science, and by creating unnecessary additional legislative barriers for researchers with little relevance to preventing drug harm. These issues are easily observed in the context of research on psilocybin-containing mushrooms in New Zealand.

Psilocybin research interest

Psilocybin-containing mushrooms are a particularly important case in point of how controlled drug legislation inhibits research. In New Zealand, these fungi are considered ‘Prohibited Plants’ (sic) and Class A substances, the strictest, most controlled drug class under New Zealand law and thus, liable for the most significant penalties for possession, use, cultivation, or distribution (Misuse of Drugs Act, 1975).

New Zealands Misuse of Drugs Act 1975 made all deposited research specimens and cultures of Psilocybe mushroom species illegal from 1992 as held in the national research collections of fungi (NZ Fungarium – PDD, NZ Culture Collection ICMP) managed by the NZ government-owned Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research (personal communication – Dr Peter Buchanan). On recognition in 2023 of this ‘illegal possession’, negotiations with government agencies were protracted before final approval was granted in 2024 to legally hold samples of these species for research purposes. ¹ This is despite many of these specimens being endemic, and psilocybin being ranked one of the least harmful drugs in New Zealand and other countries (Bonomo et al., 2019; Crossin et al., 2023; Gable, 2004; Nutt et al., 2010). Due to intense societal and research interest in psilocybin for use in mental health treatment, there is currently a growing research interest in species of fungi that contain psilocybin.

Inhibition of access to controlled species

One of the primary ways that controlled drugs legislation inhibits research into psilocybin mushrooms is through legal barriers to acquiring, and studying, such species from, and in, their natural growing environment. While the International Narcotics Control Board has made it clear that plants and fungi which contain scheduled drugs, or preparations thereof, are not under international control, they have recommended that signatory states to the international drug conventions prohibit some such species (Best, 2004; International Narcotics Control Board, 2011; Schaepe, 2001; Schouten, 2004). This move has been deservingly critiqued by Tupper (2012). Despite the United Nations’ conventions avoiding the scheduling of psilocybin-containing mushrooms, and most other psychoactive plants and fungi, many countries, such as New Zealand, have prohibited them under national laws (Misuse of Drugs Act, 1971, 1975, 1977). In New Zealand, court rulings have determined that any biological material that contains a controlled drug is a controlled drug itself, thus prohibiting access to 100s, if not 1000s, of species (Mathias and Johnston, n.d.; Tarlton v Police 1987). The ubiquity of drugs in nature would theoretically make this law unworkable; police priorities, however, appear to govern its interpretation. Mescaline-containing cacti are routinely sold in garden stores without charge, but people who sell or cultivate native psilocybin-containing mushrooms can face serious criminal charges.

Until 2024, no licence to cultivate psilocybin-containing mushrooms had ever been granted, and there had been no controlled drug licences permitting the collection or possession of ‘Psilocybe plant material’ (sic). The lack of a legal pathway to cultivate, possess or acquire psilocybin-containing mushrooms directly from their natural environment inhibited research at multiple institutions across New Zealand. New Zealand's leading research institute for fungal taxonomy, Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research, has only recently been allowed to collect and undertake research on species of the genus Psilocybe. Research projects at the University of Auckland (the authors’ lab) and the University of Canterbury (personal communication – Dr Essie Van Zuylen) have also been inhibited by an inability to undertake the most basic of mycological research tasks: the collection of fungal specimens.

Prohibition of compounds and biological species not yet known to science

While the inability to acquire psychoactive species inhibits research into specific species known to science, the determination that any biological material that contains a controlled drug is a controlled drug (Mathias and Johnston, n.d.; Tarlton v Police 1987), also controls undescribed species. This creates legal uncertainty around species that have not yet been identified or had their metabolome investigated for the presence of controlled drugs, particularly when those species are closely related to others that are psychoactive. Regarding the fungal kingdom, this is particularly problematic with most species remaining undiscovered (Bougher and Lebel, 2001; Buchanan and May, 2003; Hawksworth and Lücking, 2017). This lack of knowledge of which species exist, and which may be considered controlled, could result in researchers unknowingly collecting controlled drug-containing species that are not yet known to science. Section 29 of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975 outlines that ignorance of the presence of a controlled drug alone is not a reason enough for a suspect to be acquitted. This creates a legal risk to any researcher who may be handling species that contain controlled drugs, whether knowingly or not.

Legislation has not only prohibited access to known and novel species, but also to known and novel chemical compounds. Schedule 3, Part 7 of New Zealand's Misuse of Drugs Act 1975, akin to analogue laws in the USA, as well as similar such legislation from overseas (Controlled Substance Analogue Enforcement Act, 1986; Misuse of Drugs Act, 1971, 1975, 1977), seeks not only to prohibit stated controlled drugs, but also structurally similar compounds. New Zealand legislation limits this to compounds structurally similar to amphetamine, pethidine, phencyclidine, fentanyl, methaqualone, and dimethyltryptamine (Misuse of Drugs Act, 1975). This legislation has led to every compound of the psilocybin biosynthesis pathway, from 4-hydroxytryptamine to psilocin, as well as all their dephosphorylated byproducts, being classified as controlled drugs in New Zealand (personal communication – New Zealand Medicines Control), despite no evidence that these intermediate compounds and byproducts produce psychoactive effects in humans (Adams et al., 2022; Chadeayne et al., 2020; Rakoczy et al., 2024). For researchers who want to investigate these synthesis pathways, this creates significant hurdles with the requirement for a controlled drug licence which lists every compound, and strict requirements for record keeping and government-issued permits for certain work aspects, such as importing professionally manufactured or isolated laboratory ‘standards’. With processing times of up to 6 weeks (30 working days) for licences to export and import controlled drugs (Importing and exporting medicinal cannabis, Ministry of Health NZ, 2024), the paperwork involved in ordering these can lead to waiting periods of many months, significantly impeding research and adding additional costs. ²

Laboratory methods such as mass spectrometry require structurally similar reference standards to quantify and accurately validate the identification of compounds of interest. Due to legal wording to control analogues of known drugs, investigating natural products that may be structurally similar to controlled drugs becomes difficult. A typically simple process of re-running an analysis with a slightly different reference standard becomes a multi-month convoluted exercise.

Unnecessary legal/resource barriers with no apparent benefit to reducing drug harm

Non-medical research of controlled drugs is arguably hindered more than medical research, as there is less funding motivation, and non-medical researchers, such as ecologists, botanists, and mycologists, may not have access to secure facilities, drug safes, or institutional knowledge of controlled drugs legislation. A clear example is that until 2024, none of New Zealand's foremost mycology labs, including the national fungal collection, possessed controlled drugs licences and thus, were not legally permitted to hold any psilocybin-containing mushroom species. Such barriers have resulted in no published papers detailing New Zealand Psilocybe species since 1995 (to the author's knowledge) (Johnston and Buchanan, 1995). To keep in line with the objectives of New Zealand's United Nations treaty obligations (Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961; UNODC, 2013), the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975 should allow research to occur while limiting drug cultivation, production, or non-medical use. However, the complete lack of research on New Zealand's psilocybin-containing species for the last 30 years suggests that legislation is inhibiting research. While most commonly used illicit drugs are available on the illicit market in New Zealand, controls on research inhibit vital scientific endeavours. This presents a paradox whereby native and introduced psilocybin-containing mushrooms grow abundantly in council gardens, roadsides, and footpaths, making them available for collection and consumption, while legislative barriers tightly control medical use and research.

Conclusion

The inhibition of research was never an intended target of drug prohibition, and yet, current legislation holds back research and puts researchers at legal risk. Legislation inhibits research in natural sciences when the necessity of such research is at an all-time high due to climate change and biodiversity loss. This research inhibition is particularly ironic in the context of psilocybin-containing mushrooms, as they are the only drug shown to increase nature-relatedness, a trait shown to improve eco-friendly habits in consumers (Kettner et al., 2019). The ‘war on drugs’ is not only leading to significant environmental damage through the illicit production of psychoactive substances and control thereof (Ayres, 2020) but also through inhibiting research in the natural sciences and research of species that may improve our treatment of nature itself. To facilitate research, policy reforms should reduce legal barriers to the collection, possession and use of fungal (and plant) specimens in non-clinical research.