Hallucinogens in the NDSHS

Table 1: Summary of hallucinogen use among people aged 14 and over in 2022-‍2023

Lifetime use	12.2% (2.6 million people)
Recent use1	2.4% (500,000 people)
Change since 2019	⬆ Lifetime use (10.4%) ⬆ Recent use (1.6%)
Change since 2001	⬆ Lifetime use (7.6%) ⬆ Recent use (1.1%)
Opportunity to use in the last 12 months2	8.2%
Age group most likely to use	20-‍29 (6.8%)
Average age of first use	21.4 years (2019: 20.6 years)

Table 2: Summary of hallucinogen use among people who had used them in the previous 12 months in 2022-‍2023

Used monthly or more often	9.3%
Main form used	Mushrooms/psilocybin: 77% (2019: 61%)
Diagnosed or treated for a mental health condition	28%
High and Very high psychological distress	34%

Notes

1. Refers to use of hallucinogens in the previous 12 months.

2. Proportion of people who had been offered hallucinogens or otherwise had the opportunity to use hallucinogens in the previous 12 months.

Source: NDSHS 2022-‍2023.

Use of hallucinogens continues to increase

Use of hallucinogens in Australia has historically been smaller than commonly used illicit drugs such as cannabis, ecstasy, cocaine, and pain-relievers and opioids used for non-medical purposes

The proportion of Australians who had used hallucinogens in the previous 12 months ranged from 0.6% in 2007 to 1.6% in 2019. This increased substantially to 2.4% of the population (or about 500,000 people) in 2022-‍2023 (Figure 1). At the same time, use of most other illicit drugs remained stable or decreased since 2019, resulting in hallucinogens becoming the third most used illicit drug in Australia in 2022-‍2023.

Figure 1: Use of hallucinogens in Australia, people aged 14 and over, 2001 to 2022-‍2023

Potential impact of medical hallucinogen use

Between 2019 and 2022-‍2023, evidence of the potential medical uses of hallucinogens emerged (TGA 2023a). In Australia, prescriptions of psilocybin were introduced on 1 July 2023, after the fieldwork for the NDSHS had concluded (TGA 2023b).

The 2022-‍2023 contained no questions around medical use of, or prescriptions for, hallucinogens. All hallucinogen use was included in illicit drug use statistics.

Monitoring the use of hallucinogens (both medical and non-medical) will be required to determine whether it follows a similar trajectory to cannabis in Australia. In 2022-‍2023, around 700,000 people in Australia had used cannabis for medical purposes in the previous 12 months, but most (70%) did so without a prescription from a doctor (illicit cannabis use). Hallucinogens may follow a similar trend now that prescriptions have been introduced.

Mushrooms and psilocybin use doubled since 2019

Mushrooms/psilocybin were the most commonly used hallucinogen in 2022-‍2023, with 1.8% of people in Australia having used them in the last 12 months, double the proportion who had done so in 2019 (0.9%). This resulted in mushrooms/psilocybin overtaking LSD/acid/tabs, which also showed increasing use between 2019 (1.1%) and 2022-‍2023 (1.5%).

Figure 2: Forms of hallucinogens used by age, 2022-‍2023

2. Data are limited to people who had used hallucinogens in the previous 12 months.

Source: NDSHS 2022-‍2023, Table 5.100.

When examining people who had used hallucinogens, different age groups showed different preferences for hallucinogen forms (Figure 2). While mushrooms/psilocybin were used most by all age groups, LSD was much more likely to have been used by people in their 20s (71%) than people in their 30s (56%) or over 40 (41%).

Who was most likely to have used hallucinogens?

As with all illicit drugs, use of hallucinogens was not uniform across the Australian population in 2022-‍2023 (Figure 3).

Figure 3: Use of hallucinogens in the previous 12 months by selected characteristics, people in Australia aged 14 and over, 2019 and 2022-‍2023

Source: NDSHS 2022-‍2023, Table 5.102.

The largest differences occurred based on the socioeconomic areaswhere people lived. In 2022-‍2023, 4.3% of people who lived in the areas of most socioeconomic advantage had used hallucinogens in the previous 12 months, 6.1 times the proportion who lived the areas of most socioeconomic disadvantage (0.7%). This was primarily driven by an increase in the use of hallucinogens in the most advantaged areas, from 2.1% in 2019 to 4.3% in 2022-‍2023.

As with other illicit drugs, trans and gender diverse people (*10.3%) were more likely to have used hallucinogens in the previous 12 months than cisgender people (2.4%), and gay, lesbian, and bisexual people were 2.6 times as likely to have done so as heterosexual people (after adjusting for differences in age).

* Estimate has a relative standard error between 25% and 50% and should be interpreted with caution.

What do people think about the use of hallucinogens?

Most people (74%) disapprove of the regular use of hallucinogens. Disapproval for most illicit drugs decreased between 2019 and 2022-‍2023, and this was also true for hallucinogens (Figure 4). However, use of hallucinogens showed the largest increase in approval between 2019 and 2022-‍2023 of any drug (from 5.6% to 9.5%) and is now the second-most approved-of illegal drug (excluding pharmaceuticals) after cannabis (23%).

Figure 4: Approval of the regular use of hallucinogens, people aged 14 and over, 2007 to 2022-‍2023

Source: NDSHS 2022-‍2023, Table 11.10.

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