Mississippi Lawmakers Schedule Hearing On Ibogaine Therapy As GOP Chairman Crafts Psychedelics Bill For Next Session

Mississippi lawmakers are set to consider allowing clinical trials into the therapeutic potential of the psychedelic ibogaine in the treatment of serious mental health conditions.

A joint hearing of the House and Senate Public Health and Human Services Committees will take place on August 28, spearheaded by the House panel’s chairman Rep. Sam Creekmore (R).

The intent is to start the conversation about alternative treatment options for people with mental health conditions, particularly for military veterans experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and addiction.

Creekmore said the hearing is part of an “important effort to bring wellness, healing, and recovery to Mississippians.”

The chairman said that the hearing will help inform legislation he’s planning to introduce legislation, which he said is largely modeled after a bill that passed the Texas legislature and was signed into law in June.

That measure will create a state-backed research consortium to conduct clinical trials on ibogaine as a possible treatment for substance use disorders and other mental health conditions. The ultimate goal of the project is to develop the psychedelic into a prescription drug with U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval.

“This is a critical step forward in our commitment to not just talk about the crisis our veterans and communities face, but to take meaningful, evidence-backed action,” Creekmore said in a Facebook post.

“Rather than restoring quality of life, this pharmaceutical overload contributes to a crisis: More than 6,000 veterans die by suicide each year—including 60 to 65 Mississippians,” he said. “Countless others suffer in silence, caught between failed drug strategies and no real alternatives. This is more than a medical failure. It’s a policy failure—and one we can change.”

“That path forward begins with ibogaine—a plant-derived compound with extraordinary potential in treating opioid addiction, PTSD, and trauma-related disorders,” the chairman said.

Creekmore said he wants to see legislation advance that supports ibogaine clinical trials with public university and health care partners, push for federal rescheduling of the psychedelic, expand the state’s Right to Try law and reject “the false binary of pills or prison for those suffering from addiction.”

“Let’s be bold. Let’s be early. Let’s lead.”

Patients, medical experts and veterans are expected to participate in the hearing later this month.

“This hearing is to bring awareness about this procedure, which is not well known, and answer any questions people will have,” Creekmore told The Magnolia Tribune.

During an interview on SuperTalk Mississippi, the chairman explained that former President Richard Nixon’s drug war mission meant a “wide swath of psychotropic drugs” were placed in Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act “without a whole lot of studying this—and ibogaine got caught up in that.”

“But this is a real solution to this problem. And, you know, we’ve been in war forever,” he said. “I mean, we have veterans that are suffering, and it’s such a common issue in Mississippi and mental illness in the United States, and this is a way we can combat that.”

It remains to be seen whether the broader conservative Mississippi legislature will align with the chairman in his push for ibogaine reform, but the issue has advanced demonstrably in recent years in red and blue states alike. It’s also become a major point of conversation in Congress, where bipartisan lawmakers have worked to streamline research and access to psychedelics for therapeutic purposes.

For example, a powerful Senate committee recently approved a spending bill and attached report that promotes increased research into psychedelics.

U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is also working with the head of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Doug Collins, to advance psychedelics-assisted therapy for military veterans, and he projected that eligible candidates will see expanded access to the novel treatments within the next year.

A GOP-controlled House committee in June separately approved an amendment attached to a must-pass defense bill that would require a “progress report” on an ongoing psychedelic therapy pilot program for active duty military service members and veterans.

While Congress has been notably amenable to psychedelics research proposals in recent sessions, the House Rules Committee on Monday separately blocked a bipartisan amendment to a spending bill led by Rep. Morgan Luttrell (R-TX) that would have given DOD another $10 million to support clinical trials into the therapeutic potential of substances such as ibogaine and psilocybin.

Photo courtesy of Flickr/Scamperdale.