Natalie Lyla Ginsberg, M.S.W.
Global Impact Officer, MAPS; Policy and Advocacy Leader
MAPS's most visible policy and equity voice — the person shaping how the psychedelic medicine movement addresses racial equity, drug policy reform, and the politics of who benefits from psychedelic medicine.
Biography
Natalie Lyla Ginsberg is the Global Impact Officer at MAPS and one of the psychedelic medicine movement's most prominent voices on equity, policy, and the political dimensions of psychedelic therapy access. She holds an M.S.W. from Columbia University and worked as a policy fellow at the Drug Policy Alliance before joining MAPS.
At MAPS, Ginsberg leads work on the intersection of psychedelic medicine and broader drug policy reform, racial equity, and criminal justice — arguing that psychedelic medicine cannot be separated from the broader context of the War on Drugs, which has disproportionately criminalized Black and brown communities while the psychedelic research renaissance has enrolled predominantly white participants and built institutions in predominantly white spaces.
Ginsberg has been one of the most outspoken voices in the field challenging the psychedelic medicine community to reckon with its own racial dynamics — including who gets access to therapeutic psilocybin and MDMA, who is represented in clinical trials, and how the commercialization of psychedelic therapy may replicate existing health inequities. Her writing and speaking on these topics has influenced the equity frameworks adopted by MAPS and other organizations.
She has also been active in federal and state policy advocacy, representing MAPS before legislative bodies and working to connect the psychedelic medicine movement with allied drug policy reform organizations that have longer histories of working in communities most affected by drug prohibition.
Organizations
Why They Matter to the LearnShrooms Community
Ginsberg ensures that the psychedelic medicine movement confronts — rather than ignores — the equity and justice dimensions of its work. Without advocacy like hers, the psychedelic therapy renaissance risks becoming a premium treatment accessible primarily to affluent white patients while the communities most harmed by drug prohibition see no benefit. She represents the political maturity the movement needs.
Legal Context
For the legal landscape where Natalie Lyla Ginsberg, M.S.W. operates, see psilocybin laws in New York.