Pubdate: Mon, 08 Sep 2003
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education, The (US)
Copyright: 2003 by The Chronicle of Higher Education
Contact:  http://chronicle.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/84
Author: Peter Schmidt
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mdma.htm (Ecstasy)

JOHNS HOPKINS RESEARCHERS RETRACT REPORT ON ECSTASY STUDY

A team of scientists at Johns Hopkins University has retracted a widely 
publicized report on the harmful health effects of the drug Ecstasy after 
concluding that most of the laboratory animals in its study had mistakenly 
been given a different substance.

In a retraction scheduled to be printed this week in the journal Science, 
the researchers say that all but one of the 10 primates in its study were 
mistakenly given methamphetamine rather than the intended drug, which is 
popularly known as Ecstasy and technically referred to as 
methylenedioxymethamphetamine, or MDMA.

The report in question, "Severe Dopaminergic Neurotoxicity in Primates 
After a Common Recreational Dose of MDMA ('Ecstasy')" appeared in the 
September 27, 2002, issue of       Science, and triggered alarm and 
controversy with its conclusion that recreational users of the drug might 
be doing extensive damage to their brains' dopamine neurons and increasing 
their risk of developing a condition similar to Parkinson's disease later 
in life.

The report's findings had been based on experiments on squirrel monkeys and 
baboons. The researchers said they believed that they had injected the 
animals with MDMA, and only later determined that there had been a mix-up 
among the laboratory's drug samples, and that all but one of the animals 
had been given methamphetamine, or "speed," which is commonly linked to the 
health effects found.

The researchers discovered their error when they were unable to replicate 
their findings, and decided to examine the frozen brains of two animals 
that had died during the experiment to determine what substance the animals 
had been given, the retraction says. The retraction blames the error on the 
apparent mislabeling of bottles that a chemical supplier had shipped to the 
laboratory.

The researchers' report on their findings had been controversial at the 
time it was published. Other scientists who had been studying MDMA said 
that the animals in the Johns Hopkins study were given much larger doses of 
the substance than most human users typically consume. Some critics of the 
report accused its authors of trying to influence a debate in Congress over 
a measure, sponsored by U.S. Sen. Joseph Biden, Democrat of Delaware, 
intended to create stiff penalties for the organizers of "raves" and other 
events where Ecstasy and other drugs are consumed.

The Johns Hopkins researchers denied having any political motives. Among 
those who had strongly defended their findings was a Alan I. Leshner, a 
former director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, which had helped 
finance their work, and who is now the chief executive of the American 
Association for the Advancement of Science, which publishes Science.

On Sunday, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine issued a 
statement saying that it stands behind, and has no intention of taking any 
action against, the report's authors: George A. Ricaurte, George 
Hatzidimitriou, and Jie Yuan of the department of neurology; Brandon J. 
Cord of the department of neurosciences; and Una D. McCann of the 
department of psychiatry.

The statement notes that the scientists called attention to their own 
mistake, and says that "the researchers' efforts to investigate conflicting 
data in the laboratory are an excellent example of how science is 
self-correcting."

The statement says that the research error "in no way undermines the 
results of numerous previous studies performed in multiple laboratories 
worldwide" demonstrating that recreational doses of MDMA may have harmful 
effects on human brains.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom