People who take \u201cMolly,\u201d the powder or crystal form of MDMA, the chemical used in Ecstasy, don\u2019t know what they are actually ingesting, experts say. They warn many powders sold as Molly do not contain any MDMA.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnyone can call something Molly to try to make it sound less harmful,\u201d Rusty Payne, an agent at the Drug Enforcement Administration\u2019s (DEA) national office, told The New York Times. \u201cBut it can be anything.\u201d The DEA considers MDMA to be a Schedule I controlled substance, which means it has a high potential for abuse, and no accepted use in medical treatment.<\/p>\n
Dr. John Halpern, a psychiatrist at Harvard who has conducted several MDMA studies, said some powders sold as Molly are synthetic versions that are designed to imitate the drug\u2019s effects. The drug is now thought to be as adulterated as Ecstasy once was, he noted, adding, \u201cYou\u2019re fooling yourself if you think it\u2019s somehow safer because it\u2019s sold in powdered form.\u201d Molly has been a popular drug at music festivals. It has also been popularized by rappers. The drug costs between $20 and $50 a dose.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robert Glatter, an emergency room physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York, says he now sees about four patients a month who come in with common side effects of Molly, including teeth grinding, dehydration, anxiety, insomnia, loss of appetite and<\/p>\n
fever. More serious side effects can include uncontrollable seizures, high blood pressure, elevated body temperature and depression, the article notes.<\/p>\n
\u201cTypically in the past we\u2019d see rave kids, but now we\u2019re seeing more people into their 30s and 40s experimenting with it,\u201d he told the newspaper. \u201cMDMA use has increased dramatically. It\u2019s really a global phenomenon now.\u201d According to the national Drug Abuse Warning Network, MDMA-related emergency department visits increased from 10,227 in 2004 to 22,498 in 2011.<\/p>\n
Source:\u00a0 By Join Together Staff | www.drugfree.org\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 June 24, 2013<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" People who take \u201cMolly,\u201d the powder or crystal form of MDMA, the chemical used in Ecstasy, don\u2019t know what they are actually ingesting, experts say. They warn many powders sold as Molly do not contain any MDMA. \u201cAnyone can call something Molly to try to make it sound less harmful,\u201d Rusty Payne, an agent at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drug-specifics","category-effects-of-drugs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8949"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8949\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}