David Nutt: "Denying access to psychedelics is like denying access to the Covid-19 vaccine."
The Standard, February 7, 2024
Text: Alexandra Jones
[Photographs: Daniel Hambury/Stella Pictures Ltd]
Neuropsychopharmacologist and former government medicines official Professor David Nutt has become one of the leading scientists defending the right to psychedelic medicine for mental health. In this interview, he explains that the time to legalize is now.
At the end of the photo shoot, the image reporter asked David Nutt - a respected neuropsychopharmacologist and former government advisor on medicines - if he could record a voice message. "It's for my brother, who is a great admirer of your work." Professor David Nutt obliges, with a smile on his face. Since he was removed from state office in 2009 for claiming that LSD and ecstasy are less dangerous than alcohol, Nutt has become a cult figure among young people and misfits - more recently, his status has been reinforced by his studies of psychedelic-assisted mental health treatments.
"I was removed by the government for telling the truth about these drugs," says the 72-year-old doctor. "Of course, everyone freaked out, because no one could say something like that. What we were taught was that LSD is a very dangerous drug and blah, blah, blah - bullshit!" Still, didn't it hurt a bit? "Yes, of course - but anyway. I'm more used to public scrutiny now."
"It's very exciting," he says. "I want people to be aware of my work with psychedelic medicine because there's no other way for things to change - there's still a long way to go. In the last 15 years, we've done a lot of groundbreaking research, we've transformed the world of clinical treatments in mental health, but there are only two institutions in Britain doing this work."
David Nutt has been working in this area since the early 2000s and his pioneering 2016 study on the effects of LSD on the brain paved the way for the new era of the psychedelic renaissance. Although the headlines oversimplify this recent area of research, it's safe to say that psychedelics - when accompanied by psychotherapy - are a valuable alternative treatment for disorders such as depression, post-traumatic stress or addiction.
