How much MDMA is in your “MDMA”?; Judge largely denies DEA’s bid to dismiss testimony in upcoming DOI/DOC hearing; and sexual misconduct and adverse experiences in the underground

Plus: New Hampshire psychedelics bill dies and Massachusetts cities rally behind Question 4

Happy Friday and welcome back to The Microdose, an independent journalism newsletter brought to you by the U.C. Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics.

How much MDMA is in your “MDMA”?

For the last 25 years, only about half of samples sold as MDMA, ecstasy, or molly submitted to a drug testing program have contained only MDMA, according to a new study in Drug and Alcohol Dependence. Researchers at Georgia State University teamed up with the DrugsData Project, run by drug education non-profit Erowid, to analyze over 4,700 samples collected between 1999 and 2023. 

Overall, they found that two-thirds of the samples included some amount of MDMA. The proportion of samples with adulterated MDMA hit its peak between 1999 and 2006, and it has decreased in recent years. Around a quarter of samples contained synthetic piperazines, which can mimic the euphoric effects of MDMA, and 17% contained cathinones, a stimulant. Other stimulants like caffeine and methamphetamine were also frequently found additives, as well as other psychedelics like 5-MeO-DiPT and ketamine. 

The authors call for more resources to support drug testing efforts. “The detection of 199 unique non-MDMA adulterants in the MDMA supply over 25 years, including many novel designer drugs with unknown neurotoxicity, highlights the uncertainty and potential dangers of an unregulated drug supply,” they write. 

Judge largely denies DEA’s bid to dismiss testimony in upcoming DOI/DOC hearing

On Monday, an administrative law judge largely denied the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency’s request to exclude testimony and evidence from an upcoming hearing on the DEA’s proposal to schedule DOI and DOC. The two substances in question are frequently used in psychedelics research and are not currently federally controlled substances. Last month, the DEA filed a motion to strike the evidence and testimony provided by researchers who say scheduling the drugs will hinder psychedelic studies, claiming that such testimony was not relevant to the criteria used to determine whether a drug should be scheduled. Two weeks ago, we reported that opposition to the DEA’s move had been filed by attorneys representing Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), who offered testimony from fifteen witnesses.

In DEA Administrative Law Judge Paul Soeffing’s ruling, he denies the DEA’s request to exclude the testimony of some witnesses, saying the government agency has prematurely judged the evidence’s relevance. Additionally, the judge writes that evidence that scheduling DOI and DOC could harm research is not necessarily irrelevant, and that such testimony should not be dismissed beforehand. “To the extent that the Government asserts that any witnesses are providing testimony otherwise irrelevant to the proceedings, and a proper objection is raised in the context of the hearing, then the objection will be ruled upon at that time,” the judge writes. 

“The judge’s decision is a victory not only for scientific integrity but for the tens of thousands of Americans suffering from depression, anxiety, and chronic pain, as well as those who are at risk of opioid overdose and their loved ones, all of whom stand to benefit from the 900+ published medical studies using DOI and DOC,” said SSDP’s executive director Kat Murt of Judge Soeffing’s ruling.

A 10-day hearing is scheduled to take place during business hours at the DEA’s headquarters in Arlington, Virginia between November 12 and 25. 

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Sexual misconduct and adverse experiences in the underground

While psychedelic clinical trials researchers are required to track participants’ adverse events, people using psychedelics outside of regulated settings have few good avenues to report associated abusive or harmful experiences. A new study led by researchers at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor surveyed people who’d previously used psychedelics outside of therapeutic contexts and published their findings about respondents’ adverse experiences in Psychedelic Medicine. 

The survey included over 1,200 participants, nearly 8% of whom reported that they or someone they know had experienced inappropriate sexual contact during a psychedelic session. Roughly half of those respondents said the inappropriate behavior came from an underground guide or trip sitter. Most participants also reported having had some kind of negative experience during a trip, with nearly 75% of participants saying they’d experienced fear, and over half saying they’d experienced sadness, loneliness, or body tremors. The researchers asked participants to rate how frequently they’d experienced adverse effects, from a scale of “rarely” to “always.” Body tremors were the most common, with 10% of participants reporting they’d experienced shaking “often,” “very often,” or “always.” Several participants also reported experiencing adverse effects that persisted after their trip ended. Unlike in clinical trials, where adverse effects can include drug-induced events that don't necessarily cause harm like feelings of euphoria, the researchers asked only about experiences that were negative, like despair, antagonism, and “fear that you might lose your mind or go insane.”

Overall, the researchers say that the study underscores the importance of “stringent licensure and close regulatory oversight of psychedelic treatment providers” to minimize risk of unethical conduct as psychedelics are used in more clinical and therapeutic settings. The prevalence of these adverse effects could also increase as psychedelic use continues to become more widespread. “Our study found several acute and persisting adverse experiences that were most often rated as ‘rare’ or ‘uncommon,’ but it is important to note that ‘rare’ and ‘uncommon’ does not mean ‘never,’” the authors write. “Even if certain side effects are not experienced by most patients, they can cause considerable personal and societal harm. Therefore, careful screening and monitoring of patients, along with proper vetting, training and oversight of providers will be essential if psychedelics are implemented more widely in clinical practice.”

New Hampshire psychedelics bill dies in committee

Earlier this month, New Hampshire legislators voted against House Bill 1693, which would have created a state-regulated psychedelics program allowing the supervised use of psilocybin, LSD, and mescaline. The bill, introduced in January 2024, had been assigned to the Health, Human Services, and Elderly Affairs Committee, which discussed the bill at an October committee meeting. Legislators felt that the bill was too far-reaching and chose not to move the legislation forward but instead voted 14-1 to recommend that the state introduce future legislation that more explicitly allows psychedelics clinical trials “and other therapy” in the state. (The exact intended outcome of the legislators' recommendation is not made clear in their directive.)

Massachusetts cities rally behind Question 4

As campaigning around Massachusetts Question 4 continues, some city councils in the state have passed resolutions to endorse and support the ballot measure, which would create a state-regulated psychedelics program and allow personal use of certain psychedelics, including psilocybin. At the Northampton City Council meeting last week, counselors voted to pass a resolution supporting Question 4. The cities of Easthampton, Cambridge, Somerville, and Medford have passed similar resolutions expressing support of the measure.  

• According to a press release from Lykos Therapeutics, the company’s new CEO and Chief Medical Officer met with the FDA last week regarding Lykos’s application to use MDMA in the treatment of PTSD. The company says the meeting “resulted in a path forward, including an additional Phase 3 trial, and a potential independent third-party review of prior Phase 3 clinical data.” 

• Psychedelic Alpha explains why Bright Minds Biosciences’ stock recently jumped over 2000%. 

• In his newsletter Ecstatic Integration, writer and researcher Jules Evans gives an overview of current and upcoming efforts to advance federal legislation supporting psychedelics, and notes that funding for lobbying efforts supporting these federal-level efforts has mostly come from psychedelics companies rather than philanthropic donors. 

• The drug tabernanthalog was designed to mimic ibogaine minus the trip, yet some users say their experience with it feels “trip-adjacent.” In The Atlantic, journalist Shayla Love writes that “as the pursuit of non-hallucinogenic psychedelics advances, the definition of a trip as something induced by a discrete set of substances is set to evolve alongside them.”

• The founder of the Synaptic Institute told Willamette Week that it’s shutting down its  psilocybin facilitator training program because “there’s a lot of underemployed facilitators right now.”

Correction: In our reporting last week on Li et al (2024)’s paper titled “The association between study design and antidepressant effects in psychedelic-assisted therapy,” which examined placebo condition designs and study outcomes, we mischaracterized the researchers’ investigation of “active placebos.” Active placebos were small doses of psychedelic drugs. The post has been updated. We regret the error. 

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