Yesterday, Kentucky is taking steps to research how psychedelics could be used to treat drug addiction.

Yesterday we heard from Brian Hubbard, who was once the executive director of Kentucky's Opioid Abatement Advisory Commission.

In that role, he proposed the state use opioid settlement money to fund studies involving a powerful drug called ibogaine.

That didn't happen.

Instead, Hubbard resigned in 2023 and is now the CEO of Americans for ibogaine.

Our Emily Sisk has part two of our interview with Hubbard, which comes as the Kentucky General Assembly just passed legislation to advance research of ibogaine right here in the Commonwealth.

I want to take a second to talk about even just your history with ibogaine in Kentucky.

You know, you were head of the Opioid Abatement Advisory Council and you pushed for Kentucky to pursue ibogaine research.

This was just a few years ago that did not happen.

And now we fast forward to today.

The legislature has passed Senate Bill 77, sets up a framework for clinical research of ibogaine.

No funding yet, but it sets up the framework.

So it seems that especially the Republican supermajority in the legislature now has some appetite for what you wanted to do back in the past, but doing it a little bit in a different way.

Why do you think it didn't happen then, when you were when you were the head?

What did it take to make it happen now?

So in 2018, I read an article at a Scientific American where researchers at New York University had discovered that what we call the magic mushroom, or the active ingredient of salmon, had created a dramatic reduction in alcohol use among folks who had been alcoholics for years.

So when I got the opportunity, thanks to former Deputy Attorney General Barry Dunn under then Attorney General Daniel Cameron to lead the Kentucky Opioid Commission, I reached out to an author by the name of Julia Robert.

I had read her work in Substack publications, and she discussed how her own use of psychedelics had helped her overcome, an adult lifetime of treatment resistant anxiety and depression, a near-fatal eating disorder, and, her own disbelief and a higher power that said, hey, what can you tell me about the world of psychedelics and whether there's anything that has a special application to opioid dependency, she said.

Have you ever heard of ibogaine?

What I was told about ibogaine and what it could do through the recovery story of a lady by the name of Juliana mulligan.

When I heard her story, I said, oh, my inside.

I'm going to do everything I can to learn as much as I can to understand whether this is that incredible, and if it is, I am going to ask Attorney General Cameron to give us an opportunity through the Kentucky Opioid Commission to explore setting aside 5% or $42 million.

At that time, the state's total sediments were about $842 million.

Let's set aside 5% of this money, to determine whether there is a potential therapeutic breakthrough we can foster for the opioid epidemic in Kentucky.

So, on May the 31st of 2023, on the lawn of the Kentucky State Capitol, I had the privilege of announcing as the first chairman of the Kentucky Opioid Commission that we were going to pursue an exploration of setting aside $42 million to create a public private partnership to drive ibogaine all the way through the FDA's drug development process.

And anybody today can go online and look up three public hearings held at the Kentucky Supreme Court Administrative Office of the courts in 2023, former Texas Governor Rick Perry testified in that video.

We had a video message from a tribal leader in Gabon expressing solidarity with Kentucky on the pursuit of this project.

It was phenomenal.

And then it's a University of Kentucky's request in what was a true jokey Smurf.

Open the box moment.

They demanded a hearing in October of 23 because their position was the FDA will never approve this trial because of the cardiac risk associated with it.

All drugs come with risk.

As long as risk can be mitigated.

The FDA will consider approving a trial for any medication, and there is no reason to assert that the cardiac risk for ibogaine is a disqualifier.

And so now we come full circle with the conversation I get to have with you for the very first time on Kentucky television just last Wednesday.

In true and customary form, the Kentucky legislature overrode Andy Beshear to make Senate Bill 77, which is the Kentucky abrogated initiative as originally proposed law of the state.

And this is just the beginning.

We are not going to stop until the people of this state are at the front of the line to overcome an opioid epidemic that begins here in the moments that we have remaining.

To two final questions.

Is there anything you would have done differently in Kentucky as far as suggesting to utilize the opioid settlement money?

Because that seemed to kind of be where the discrepancy or where the issue was.

Looking back now, would you have done any of that differently?

So Kentucky could have been on the fast track and been the first to do this.

I'll tell you what I would have done differently.

I had a lot of internal interference, as did my staff.

This project was pursued.

I think that if I had it to do all over again, instead of forbearing with that interference, instead of forbearing with that difficulty, I would have requested a meeting with Attorney General Cameron to tell him about the difficulties that I was facing, so that I would have had a much for your hand to engage press not just at the local level, but at the national media to advertise and to celebrate what we were doing so that we could have created the kind of political momentum around Kentucky that has been generated nationally to produce the executive order from President Trump.

For folks who might be watching.

When could they expect to see ibogaine treatment available?

What is it going to take?

How long did it take to get to that point?

Well, the first thing that we have to initiate is an FDA drug development trial.

Texas is well on its way to initiating that process with the executive order of President Trump.

The federal government has been specifically directed to align resources, regulations, and technical technical support in partnership with the states to create a federal state FDA ibogaine drug development trial that will play out nationally.

It is my hope that within the next 18 months, that phase one trial will begin, or perhaps even start right into phase two, so that every state that is a participant in this trial framework can put its people to the front of the line.

And while Kentucky's measure is not currently funded, the potential is there to fund it in 2027, perhaps even with opioid fans.

Are always wished for Kentucky to be the leader of this endeavor.

It was a wonderful chance for this state of all of them, for the opioid epidemic began to lead the whole country out of it.

And while it's not the first, it still has the opportunity to be among the first.

Well, Mr.

Hubbard, we will keep following all the updates that are beginning.

But we so appreciate your time and telling us all about the developments.

Thank you so much for being with us.

Thank you.

And thank you, Emily.

As part of the new law that came from Senate Bill 77, the Kentucky Department of Agriculture can partner with drug developers to conduct clinical trials involving ibogaine.