Senate Appropriators have released their FY 2027 Ag-FDA & MilCon-VA bills containing the most robust language to date directed at psychedelic use in healthcare, with no additional funding. Per Psychedelic State(s) of America, Senate Appropriators have now directed the VA regarding psychedelic medicine in four consecutive years, calling for a plan to begin delivering any FDA-approved psychedelic medicines within 180 days of the bill taking effect.
To date, over the last decade, Congress has funded a mere $10.2 million towards psychedelic research, and proposed $922 million for VA Medical & Prosthetic Research – a reduction from $945 million last year, against a backdrop of declining VA mental health clinicians and discontinued VA research grants.
President’s Administration announced up to $4.9M via ARPA-H to advance development of ibogaine for the treatment of PTSD (with plans to commercialise a version via Mark Cuban’s Cost Plus Drug Company, at cost + modest profit and released to inform future psychedelic medicines) on Thursday, together with a $20M RFA from NIMH for research into ‘fast-acting’ psychedelic medicines including ketamine & psilocybin.
As noted in the article above, if a psychedelic is approved by the FDA next month, an estimated 100k veterans could potentially receive treatment via the VA. VA’s own analysis projects only ‘low thousands’ of patients in the initial year of availability owing to clinician capacity. Several states have proactively created pools of licensed providers to enable the rollout of such therapies and should be recognised for the progress achieved to date in filling a gap that Congress has repeatedly directed others to fill.
Directives alone won’t change patient care. There must be investment in VA preparedness and support of state psychedelic medicine efforts to match Congressional enthusiasm.
Drawing on reporting from Jack Gorsline, Psychedelic State(s) of America (12 Nov 2026).
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