$740m veterans plan to fund social rehabilitation and psychedelic treatments for PTSD

Veterans in Australia are set to receive expanded government-funded “rehabilitation” support totaling about $739 million across four years, including non-clinical social wellbeing programs. The package will fund activities such as yoga, surf therapy, cooking lessons, music and arts courses, peer-to-peer programs, and community memberships, aimed at helping veterans reintegrate with civilian life. For veterans with the worst, most resistant PTSD, the Department of Veterans Affairs will also begin funding licensed MDMA-assisted and psilocybin-assisted treatments with strict safeguards, as well as medicinal cannabis for chronic pain and other physical illnesses. The article frames these psychedelic and medicinal options as last-resort, intensive treatment pathways (with preparatory work and follow-up therapy) enabled by faster claim processing, alongside broader reforms responding to the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide.