Colorado voters passed the Natural Medicine Health Act in November 2022 C.E., making the state home to the most comprehensive psychedelic decriminalization law in the United States. The measure goes further than any previous state-level drug reform by fully removing criminal penalties for the personal use, possession, growth, transportation, and sharing of several natural psychedelic substances — and by creating a licensed clinic system to bring psychedelic-assisted therapy into regulated practice.
At a glance
- Colorado psychedelic decriminalization: The Natural Medicine Health Act explicitly states that personal use and possession of plants containing psilocybin, DMT, ibogaine, and mescaline (excluding peyote) are no longer offenses under state law and cannot serve as grounds for detention, search, or arrest.
- Psychedelic therapy clinics: The Act calls for a government-run Natural Medicine Advisory Board to develop licensing rules and establish regulated psychedelic therapy clinics in Colorado by the end of 2024 C.E.
- Drug reform milestone: Colorado was one of the first two U.S. states to legalize recreational marijuana in 2012 C.E., and advocates are watching to see whether it will again set the pace for nationwide policy change.
What makes this law different
The Colorado measure is broader than Oregon’s 2020 C.E. ballot measure, which addressed only the psilocybin compound found in so-called magic mushrooms. Colorado’s law covers multiple natural psychedelic substances, and it does not allow individual counties to opt out of hosting licensed clinics — a provision designed to prevent the geographic fragmentation that has occurred in Oregon, where some counties have moved to block clinic access.
The decriminalization provision is also more complete than Oregon’s. Oregon’s 2020 C.E. measure still classified personal drug use as a “Class E” violation, leaving room for police to issue fines and engage with users. Colorado’s law removes that ambiguity for the covered substances: personal use is explicitly not an offense, and authorities cannot use it as the basis for any enforcement action.
The substances covered — psilocybin, DMT, ibogaine, and mescaline (with the specific exclusion of peyote, a plant with deep significance to several Indigenous communities) — reflect a deliberate focus on naturally occurring psychedelics. Ibogaine, derived from the iboga plant used in spiritual practice in central Africa, has attracted growing scientific interest as a potential treatment for addiction. Research published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2022 C.E. found that psilocybin-assisted therapy showed promise for treatment-resistant depression, adding clinical weight to the reform movement.
The science driving the push
The political shift did not happen in a vacuum. Over the past decade, a wave of clinical research from institutions including Johns Hopkins University has examined psychedelics as potential tools for treating depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, addiction, and end-of-life anxiety. The Food and Drug Administration has granted “breakthrough therapy” status to psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression, a designation that signals the agency believes early clinical evidence is especially promising and warrants expedited development.
This accumulation of research gave the Natural Medicine Health Act a grounding that earlier drug reform efforts often lacked — a clinical and public health rationale that extended the conversation beyond decriminalization alone and toward structured therapeutic access.
Real opposition, real questions
The measure passed in a close vote, and it drew notable opposition — including from people who support psychedelic decriminalization itself. Critics within the natural medicine community argued the law tilts too heavily toward a corporate-friendly regulatory model, potentially concentrating access in expensive licensed clinics that price out the people who could benefit most.
Nicole Foerster of Decriminalize Nature Boulder County lobbied against the proposition, arguing it should have focused solely on decriminalization. “We cannot forget that the decriminalization and personal use protections are the most important part of this measure and unfortunately the most vulnerable,” Foerster said. “Many of us who voted no support decriminalization but believe the measure should have stopped there rather than prioritizing regulated access.”
The law also leaves unresolved a practical question: it does not define how much of a substance constitutes “personal use,” creating potential ambiguity in enforcement. How regulators and courts interpret that threshold will shape how protective the decriminalization provisions actually prove to be in practice.
A second bellwether?
Colorado was one of the first two U.S. states — alongside Washington — to legalize recreational marijuana at the 2012 C.E. general election. In the years that followed, dozens of states and several countries moved toward cannabis legalization, following a path Colorado helped establish.
Whether psychedelic reform follows a similar arc remains to be seen. But the Natural Medicine Health Act gives researchers, therapists, patients, and policymakers a real-world regulatory framework to study — one that could inform how other states and countries think about mental health treatment options that fall outside the traditional pharmaceutical model.
The law represents a genuine step forward for people who have not found relief through conventional treatments. Whether it delivers on that promise depends on how the Advisory Board builds the clinic system — and whether access remains broad enough to matter.
Read more
For more on this story, see: New Atlas — Colorado voters pass historic psychedelic decriminalization act
For more from Good News for Humankind, see:
- Alzheimer’s risk cut in half by drug in landmark prevention trial
- Renewables now make up at least 49% of global power capacity
- The Good News for Humankind archive on mental health
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