The world of organic shrooms organicshroomcanada.co has exploded in popularity thanks to the Netflix series “How To Change Your Life With Magic Mushrooms.” Though still illegal, the mushrooms’ psychoactive compound, psilocybin, is said to treat mental health conditions such as anxiety and depression. But the industry’s future remains murky.

Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy is already being used for some patients, but it’s not a cure-all. Currently, the drug is only available by prescription, through an exemption from a minister or as part of clinical trials. And although studies have shown that psilocybin can reduce the risk of suicide, its potential to cause psychosis has led many people to avoid the drug altogether.

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That could be changing. The number of Reddit forums discussing microdosing has doubled since 2018; searches for psilocybin on Google have increased sevenfold. And a handful of companies are vying to capitalize on the phenomenon by cultivating and selling fungi that they claim have medicinal properties.

One Vancouver company, Optimi Health, has already raised $20.7 million in an oversubscribed IPO and listed on the Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE). Its 20,000-square-foot facility is said to be the largest state-of-the-art psychedelic mushroom cultivation facility in the world.

Other companies are following suit, including Albert Labs. This privately held company of 10 employees is domiciled in B.C. and has a lab in Burnaby, but it plans to export its products overseas. It has licenses to grow, export, and extract psilocybin and other psychedelic chemicals, and it generates some revenue from third-party testing of the drugs.