Awakn Life Sciences Corp. (NEO: AWKN) (OTCQB: AWKNF) (FSE: 954) has signed an agreement with an anonymous entity in Portugal to help establish a series of psychedelics clinics there. Awakn will also be providing that party with a license for its clinical protocols and training.
The United Kingdom-based company announced the new agreement on Tuesday and will support the unnamed Portuguese healthcare consortium currently operating in “stealth-mode” to establish the new facilities, the first of which will be situated in Lisbon.
This will be the first licensing partnership Awakn has entered into in Europe.
.@AnthonyTennyson comments on Awakn's Licensing Partnership agreement in Europe with a healthcare consortium. Learn more here: https://t.co/e12HnXvvWp $AWKN $AWKNF pic.twitter.com/XtLARxUyCu
— Awakn™ Life Sciences (@awakn_ls) February 22, 2023
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Awakn’s clinical protocols are used for the treatment of alcohol use disorder, eating disorders, PTSD and depression. The company will be providing the Portuguese partner with a license to those protocols for 10 years and will also be training its clinicians on how to properly utilize them.
Awakn specializes in treating mental health and addiction disorders through psychedelic-assisted therapy with ketamine and MDMA. In December, Awakn received a $2.5 million grant from United Kingdom health authorities for a large-scale clinical trial studying the efficacy of ketamine for the treatment of alcohol use disorder.
According to Awakn, Portugal has a high rate of mental health conditions within its population. Somewhere between 20-30 per cent of its citizens have faced challenges with mental health in their lifetime.
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Possession of all drugs for personal use has been decriminalized in Portugal since 2001, but the sale or distribution of significant quantities of substances like MDMA, ketamine or psilocybin remains illegal unless authorized by health authorities in the country.
“Law 30/2000, adopted in November 2000 but in place since July 2001, decriminalized consumption, acquisition and possession of drugs for personal consumption,” says the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug addiction in reference to narcotic drugs and psychoactive substances in Portugal.
In September last year, Toronto’s Psyence Group Inc. (CSE: PSYG) (OTCQB: PSYGF) was able to export psilocybin mushrooms to its research partner in the country Psilo Pharma, but had to obtain stringent permissions from Portuguese regulators to do so.
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