Psilocybin worked for 50 years. It was shelved not because it failed, but because no one could own it.
A naturally occurring molecule with no patent runway has no salesforce, no DTC ad budget, and no investor case. The incentive to bring it to market simply does not exist under the current architecture.
Now that synthetic analogs can be patented, the same system that ignored psilocybin for 50 years is racing to bring it to market — at 100x the price of the natural compound.
The mirror reveals the true filter on what reaches patients: not safety, not efficacy, but ownership economics.
The Structural Flip
Fund the molecule the incentive ignores. That's where the asymmetric public-health return lives.