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How do medical researchers obtain illegal drugs?

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Many well-known chemical supply companies sell controlled substances. They are usually massively expensive compared to street prices. Here is a link to Sigma-Aldrich's catalog entry for MDMA, roughly $800 for a human dose: http://www. read more

Given the expense of commercial controlled substances, the National Institute on Drug Abuse runs a program to provide researchers with chemicals that are unavailable, difficult to obtain, or overly expensive to buy. read more

Drugs seized by law enforcement are not parceled out to labs for human or animal research, but they are tested by the Drug Enforcement Agency to keep track of variants and contaminants. The DEA naturally keeps a close eye on scheduled substances destined for science labs, too, issuing licenses for every step of the process from manufacture to research. read more

Despite that, scientists have a harder time doing research on the potential medical benefits of marijuana than they do on "harder" drugs like ecstasy or magic mushrooms. The public may think of pot use as no big deal, but federal laws make it difficult for researchers to obtain legal supplies. read more

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