Someone sent me this from reddit. The Guardian article is from 2003, don't know why it appeared on reddit today. Maybe it's because today is Memorial Day, and ecstasy is a treatment for PTSD. This is another example of how conservatives use bad science to make bad policy.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2003/sep/07/drugsandalcohol.scienceScientists admit: we were wrong about 'E'
Experts who gave a dramatic warning that ecstasy led to brain damage based their study on a huge blunder, reports health editor Jo Revill
* The Observer, Sunday 7 September 2003
It was billed as the one of the most dramatic warnings the world has ever received over the dangers of ecstasy. A study from one of America's leading universities concluded that taking the drug for just one evening could leave clubbers with irreversible brain damage, and trigger the onset of Parkinson's disease.
The study, published in the eminent journal Science last September, had an immediate impact. Doctors and anti-drug crusaders spoke of a 'neurological time bomb' facing the young. Others suggested that taking one of the tablets was the equivalent of playing Russian roulette with the brain, and demanded tighter 'anti-rave' laws to deal with it.
<snip>
Yesterday, Ricaurte was attempting to put a brave face on the calamity. He is under attack from all sides, and has already been accused of rushing his study into print because Congress was looking at a bill known as the Anti-Rave Act, which would punish club owners who knew that drugs such as ecstasy were being used on their premises.
Ricaurte has denied political bias. He said yesterday that his laboratory made 'a simple human error', adding: 'We're scientists, not chemists.' Asked why the vials of liquid were not checked before being used on the animals, he replied: 'We're not chemists. We get hundreds of chemicals here - it's not customary to check them.'
<snip>
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