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Harm reduction specialists, Mat Southwell and Alexei Lakhov draw on their lived experience as people who use drugs to reflect on new guidance on drug decriminalisation. They share hope that creating a legal enabling environment for the HIV response will help end AIDS among people who use drugs.

The publication of UNAIDS’ Decriminalization of Drug Use to Reduce HIV and Harm guidance marks a decisive moment at the intersection of drug policy, global health and human rights.

In 2022, she took part in a clinical trial investigating psilocybin as a potential treatment. For the first time, something helped. Then the trial ended, and she was left with no means of lawfully accessing the treatment.

The Czech Republic has quietly produced one of the most practical and credible frameworks for therapeutic psilocybin to date. This article walks through its key provisions and asks what a comparable NHS programme might actually look like.

In the year 2000, psychiatry experienced one of the most important breakthroughs in decades: researchers showed that ketamine, a widely used anesthetic, could produce a powerful antidepressant effect within hours.

A year ago, Tadeusz Hawrot wrote about the beginnings of a promising development in drug policy; the potential rescheduling of psychedelics in Ukraine.

The Department of Health and Social Care is correct that smoking is a uniquely harmful way of consuming nicotine and remains the leading cause of preventable death and disease in the UK. It is estimated that two in three long-term smokers will die as a result of their smoking (NHS, 2023).

In late April, the Donald Trump administration announced plans to reschedule marijuana from a Schedule I to Schedule III substance.

On Saturday, Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at accelerating clinical research into psychedelic drugs. The order focuses on expanding federal funding, reducing bureaucratic barriers, and speeding up regulatory timelines. The move signals a notable shift in U.S. federal posture toward psychedelics—distinct from ongoing developments at the state level—and arguably represents one of the most significant federal actions on psychedelic research and access to date.

Psychedelic policy in the US is shifting fast, but is public opinion keeping pace? A landmark 2025 RAND survey of over 10,000 Americans explored which psychedelics the public supports legalising, why psilocybin leads the pack, and what the road to reform might actually look like.

Drawing on archival research from the UN, Sweden, and the United States, a recent publication traces how psychedelics were swept into the 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances through moral panic, Cold War politics, and the absence of any powerful lobby to defend them.

In Brazil, the debate on the use of psychedelic substances for therapeutic purposes has been gaining momentum, especially when it comes to psilocybin.

The Department of Veterans Affairs in Australia have recently decided to fund MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for PTSD and psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy for treatment resistant depression among military veterans.

When teachers confiscate a vape from a student, they often assume it contains nicotine or perhaps even cannabis. What many don’t realise, is that some of these vapes contain Spice, a dangerous synthetic drug that young people often mistake for cannabis.

Drug related deaths are preventable most of the times and these increasing number on drug deaths prove that the government is failing to provide essential care to its citizens.

Drug Science responded to the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs’ (ACMD’s) call on Ketamine use, harms and interventions. We hope that our evidence can help to develop rational debate, policy making and scheduling about Ketamine.

Germany has recently taken a landmark step by introducing compassionate access to psilocybin for patients with treatment-resistant depression (TRD), marking the first such programme in the European Union.

Despite the resurgence of research into the clinical efficacy and mechanism of action of psychedelic drugs such as such as psilocybin, LSD, DMT, and MDMA they are currently in Schedule 1 of the Misuse of Drugs regulations 2001.

In 1996, Purdue Pharmaceutical's (Purdue) launched OxyContin, an opioid painkiller, with the largest marketing strategy in pharmaceutical history. Literature has now established that Purdue's marketing of OxyContin was a root cause of the current opioid crisis, responsible for over 600,000 deaths in and beyond North America.

Opioid-related deaths in Ontario remain persistently high, driven largely by an unstable and unregulated drug supply. In response, harm reduction services, such as supervised consumption sites/consumption and treatment services and safer supply programs, have been implemented to reduce the risks of overdose and connect people who use drugs with essential healthcare and social services.

Last week, the Ministry of Health quietly marked a historic milestone: it granted a license to Christchurch-based psychiatrist Professor Cameron Lacey to prescribe psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression. This is the first time the psychedelic compound will be legally prescribed in New Zealand outside of a clinical trial.