Post-traumatic stress disorder is real. New Compass Pathways data suggest psilocybin may be remarkably helpful.

More top line results released from a COMP360 clinical trial provide hope

I've come to a horrifying realization. First, I will set it up for you. I never liked the Grateful Dead. I listen to Phish— despite having matriculated for high school to the Taft school in Watertown Connecticut, the alma mater of Trey, their singer. I don't use recreational drugs. I never have. I've never had a drink. I looked down on my high school classmates who like to get high. I didn't really hang out with people in college who were getting high. I was also, and I'm not proud of this, judgmental of the behavior. Why do you want to get high all the time?!

Maybe, maybe, the reason my classmates were using so many recreational substances—prominently psychedelic compounds—is that they may be potent. We use the term “self-medicating” quite frequently in medicine. We mean it as an insult. To denigrate the practice. I'm not advocating “taking just anything” to treat medical conditions.

However, one of the guiding principles in my life is, at this point, assuming people do th…