Psychedelics have gone mainstream – don't buy into it
A quick Google of the word ' psychedelics ' tells you why there is such a glut of interest. The first three headlines: 'Can psychedelic therapy go mainstream?', 'Psychedelic medicine could revolutionise how we treat mental illness' and 'Psychedelics may offer hope for treatment of eating disorders.' The next few hundred headlines are similar. The psychedelics are coming for your mental health.
Psychedelics, as Prideaux said, have had a 'reputational glow-up' in recent years, transforming in the public mind from bogeyman life-destroyers favoured by opt-out beatniks to miracle drugs for all and any mental health conditions. Prideaux – who took LSD on four occasions 10 years ago when he was 17 and, among the enjoyable moments, suffered from violent stomach pains and HPPD (hallucinogen persisting perception disorder) – is both surprised at the surge in popularity of psychedelics and concerned about their spread as a medical cure-all.
It hardly needs stating that Prideaux found that not nearly enough research or clinical trials have been done around the medical use of the drugs – the question is, why then are they being pushed so aggressively towards the mental health sector?
The answer was depressingly obvious. In the first quarter of 2025, more than $350m was invested in psychedelic biotech companies. Like the opiate industry before it, the psychedelic lobby in the US has been evangelical about promoting its products, roping in veterans suffering from PTSD (as they did with opioids and veterans living with pain).
Side-effects, malpractice and even deaths have been unreported or brushed under the carpet as a booming new market seeks to take advantage of a sea change in public and political opinion (one of those hundreds of headlines reads: 'How MAGA learnt to love psychedelics'). Instead there exists a mushy atmosphere of woowoo, with phrases such as 'net-zero trauma' and 'inner healer' bandied around among the easy-win headlines about magic mushrooms curing depression. They'll change your life, man. Well, yes, quite possibly, but could we have a few more double-blind clinical trials first?
Prideaux did not deny that psychedelics seem to work incredibly well, and incredibly quickly, for some people suffering from a broad spectrum of mental health conditions. Hayward's series, meanwhile, uncovered another depressing truth – in the 'pre-prohibition era of psychedelics', in the early to mid-20th century, research was booming, but the whole industry was driven underground when the societal winds changed in the 1960s. Only now are we starting to scratch at the surface of what psychedelics might be capable of.
Hayward wanted, in particular, to find out what was going on in a brain altered by psychedelic drugs, which led to some extremely entertaining segments about drug users chatting to superintelligent gnomes and the idea that the key to understanding human consciousness lies in the venom gland of the Colorado River toad. Yet while both programmes hinted that humanity is on the cusp of unlocking all sorts of exciting things via the substances that led to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, the overall effect was a little dispiriting.
Political fear brought about the suppression of research into psychedelics more than half a century ago, and now the allure of private financial gain is getting that research moving again. I lost count of the amount of times a neuroscientist ended a sentence with 'but we just don't know enough yet' or 'but the evidence isn't here yet'. 'Journalists look for simple narratives,' said one researcher to Prideaux. I tried looking for one, but these trips messed with my mind. More research is needed.
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