cuz when they test "ecstasy users" the haul in random people off the street, who's pills could have been cut with anything from ket to meth. if they actually organised for say 15 or 20 people who have never taken drugs before to take maybe 100 to 120 mg mdma once or twice a month over the course of a year, THAT would be an accurate study. and i really doubt theyd find any serious brain damage. if any at all.
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Study suggests little evidence Ecstasy causes brain damage
- Thread starter Ismene
- Start date
People always bring that argument up, but it is in fact the MDMA that is doing some hefty damage. Numerous legitimate research shows that damage can be done, only ignorant people deny them all. And also a point that is usually true, people who specifically use ecstasy are usually using other drugs as well. Its rare that a person is only using ecstasy and nothing else.
flounderingaround
Greenlighter
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- Mar 22, 2011
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- 21
What's interesting about the study that recently came out in Addiction is that it continues the research into clinical manifestations of MDMA use. There is zero doubt that MDMA leaves chemical evidence of its presence in the brain, both neurochemically and physically. Multiple studies have shown discernible differences between non-users' and users' brains.
What matters to users, though, will not be what is happening on a molecular level, but what is happening in a real-life, or "clinical" level. If MDMA users are sustaining damage at the molecular level that never manifests as symptoms, then users can make decisions based on those outcomes. An example can be drawn from the effects of urban living on lung tissue of non-smokers. Autopsies of non-smokers who have lived in medium to large sized cities have lung tissue which is a dark shade of grey as opposed to the light pink of people who lived in rural areas. There is clear molecular damage to the lungs of all city-dwellers, and it is indisputable. However, clinical, real-life consequences of this damage is insignificant to most peoples' lives, spare extreme conditions.
This doesn't that the chemical damage that appears to result from MDMA doesn't cause long-term clinical problems. But it does say that we need more than molecular and imaging studies that show chemical damage by MDMA. We need neurocognitive studies like the study in Addiction that attempts to find real-life results of MDMA use. So far, studies have found either very minor or no change at all. There needs to be more research, of course, but it is telling that after all these years medical research is still unable to show clear, definitive consequences to MDMA use.
This doesn't contradict individual stories of lives ruined by MDMA use. Individual cases will always present themselves, but if they could be demonstrated and reproduced across whole populations of users they would be, and it would be in the medical literature.
What matters to users, though, will not be what is happening on a molecular level, but what is happening in a real-life, or "clinical" level. If MDMA users are sustaining damage at the molecular level that never manifests as symptoms, then users can make decisions based on those outcomes. An example can be drawn from the effects of urban living on lung tissue of non-smokers. Autopsies of non-smokers who have lived in medium to large sized cities have lung tissue which is a dark shade of grey as opposed to the light pink of people who lived in rural areas. There is clear molecular damage to the lungs of all city-dwellers, and it is indisputable. However, clinical, real-life consequences of this damage is insignificant to most peoples' lives, spare extreme conditions.
This doesn't that the chemical damage that appears to result from MDMA doesn't cause long-term clinical problems. But it does say that we need more than molecular and imaging studies that show chemical damage by MDMA. We need neurocognitive studies like the study in Addiction that attempts to find real-life results of MDMA use. So far, studies have found either very minor or no change at all. There needs to be more research, of course, but it is telling that after all these years medical research is still unable to show clear, definitive consequences to MDMA use.
This doesn't contradict individual stories of lives ruined by MDMA use. Individual cases will always present themselves, but if they could be demonstrated and reproduced across whole populations of users they would be, and it would be in the medical literature.