Co-Sponsor Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces

By DANIEL CHACÓN
The Santa Fe New Mexican

First marijuana, now magic mushrooms.

A state known for ending up at the bottom of a long list of rankings could be among the first in the nation to roll out a program for medical use of psilocybin mushrooms, commonly known as magic mushrooms.

The Senate Judiciary Committee late Wednesday endorsed Senate Bill 219 on an 8-1 vote.

The lone holdout, Sen. Katy Duhigg, D-Albuquerque, praised psilocybin’s efficacy.

“I am very torn on this because I know that psilocybin has amazing potential for substance use disorder, intractable depression,” she said. “I think it’s a really important medicine to have available.”

But Duhigg said one of her brothers, an addiction psychiatrist who has been involved in multiple studies and pilot programs using psilocybin, told her researchers have yet to develop a model for safe medical use.

“He worries that if we do this as a state, and it does not have kind of the level of oversight that these projects have now with the federal government, that there’s going to be some negative results … that will set this whole movement back significantly,” she said.

Despite her words of caution, SB 219 cleared its second committee hearing with a number of amendments and is headed to the Senate floor.

Its trip through the Roundhouse doesn’t end there, though.

If the bill makes it out of the Senate, it still has to go through the House and its committees.

Advocates told lawmakers during Wednesday’s hearing psilocybin mushrooms are not only life-changing but life-saving.

Crystal C. Romero, a retired master sergeant who served in the New Mexico Army National Guard, said she served with honor, knowing the risks and sacrifices she’d have to make.

“But nothing prepared me for the battle within my head,” she said, adding she was medically discharged from the military for post-traumatic stress disorder and then attempted suicide.

“Had I succeeded, my three daughters would have been handed more than just a folded flag,” she said. “They would have inherited my pain.”

Romero said she “tried everything the VA has had to offer” but still battled relentless suicidal ideation.

“It wasn’t until I worked with psilocybin under guided care that I found healing,” she said.

David Glass, an emergency room doctor and active duty veteran who served multiple tours in Afghanistan and Iraq, said he’s witnessed “the devastating impact of mental health crisis” both in the ER room and among his fellow veterans.

“I can count on two hands the number of service members I know personally that died in combat. I can count on two hands the number of veterans I know that have committed suicide since taking off the uniform and leaving service,” he said. “But now, I can tell you honestly and truthfully that I can now count on more than two hands the number of special operators whose lives have been saved by taking psilocybin through guided therapy in Mexico.”

Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces, who is among the sponsors of the bill, said the measure starts with four qualifying conditions: major depressive disorder, substance use disorder, PTSD and end-of-life anxiety. Under the bill, the program would not start until Dec. 31, 2027.

“The Department of Health would establish and make rules for everything, from who the qualifying license providers to producers to dosage to medical setting,” he said. “Unlike cannabis, this would only be administered in a medical setting. … This would not be like cannabis. There is no car. There is no taking this at home. Very different in that respect.”

The bill also creates an advisory board and would allow the state’s health secretary to add additional qualifying medical conditions “as there’s data to support that,” Steinborn said.

Another sponsor, Sen. Martin Hickey, D-Albuquerque, a retired physician, said the benefits of psilocybin mushrooms would be far-reaching.

“This is as important to society as the other fungus that blew in off of a windowsill onto a Petri dish with pneumococcal bacteria and we got penicillin,” he said. “This is a fungus that in mental health is going to have as dramatic an impact.”