On Saturday local time, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at speeding up the research and approval process of psychedelic therapies, focusing on drugs such as ibogaine, which are used to treat post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, addiction and other conditions.
Trump said the original intention of the executive order was to help veterans with severe mental illness and provide them with new treatment options.
"In many cases, these experimental treatments have shown the potential to change lives and help people suffering from severe mental illness and depression, including our respected veterans who are in deep mental distress today," Trump said.
Ibogaine is a plant-derived psychoactive compound; current research on depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety disorders, and traumatic brain injury is very limited. Most of the existing evidence comes from animal experiments and early human trials with extremely small sample sizes and strong limitations. Conclusions from animal experiments cannot be directly applied to humans, and experimental results often cannot be reproduced in humans.