About 1 in 5 women will experience depression and anxiety during pregnancy or in the year after giving birth. If untreated, a mother who has these conditions has a higher risk of birth complications, overall poorer health, impaired bonding and nurturing of her infant, and a higher risk of death by suicide.
But a new treatment moving through the Food and Drug Administration clinical trials process may be key to treating, or even curing, depression and anxiety in postpartum people. It is a newly named psychedelic, luvesilocin. It functions like psilocin, the psychoactive chemical within psilocybin mushrooms. It may be able to positively affect the unique hormonal shifts, brain changes and disconnection that can lead to these conditions like no existing treatments.
