I’m a process chemist. I do this for a living. I’ve made kilo-scale batches of pharmaceuticals at work that have gone through the regulatory process and made it into people. I went to school for ten years to do this.

This is a colossally dangerous thing.

Every time you run a chemical synthesis, you generate impurities. Slightly different temperatures, concentrations, reagent quality, and a million other things will vary the identities and concentrations of those impurities in your product.

The nature of biochemistry is that most compounds, even at very small concentrations, can have effects. Usually bad ones. So drugs have tight specs on how much of each potential impurity can be present. Usually it’s in the 0.1% range, but sometimes a lot lower.

Detection of impurities at that level cannot be done with ‘hacker’ gear in your garage. So if you do this, you’re going to be taking unknown quantities of unknown impurities.

There are trade-offs. If you’re definitely gonna die without the medicine, then the worst that can happen is you die faster, or more painfully. If it’s medicine to maintain quality of life, then you might die fast and painfully.

I’m not saying the current system is good at all. Medicine is too expensive. It shouldn’t be limited by right wing nutjobs. Those things are true. Those things require a solution.

This is not a good solution.

[–] Gaywallet@beehaw.org 8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I appreciate your warning, and would like to echo it, from a safety perspective.

I would also like to point out that we should be approaching this, as every risk, from a harm reduction standpoint. A drug with impurities that could save your life or prevent serious harm is better than no drug and death. People need to be empowered to make the best decisions they can, given the available resources and education.

[–] becausechemistry@lemm.ee 3 points 1 week ago

make the best decisions they can

I would recommend an HPLC and a competent analytical chemist to gather data and decide whether or not a batch is safe to consume.

[–] xilliah@beehaw.org 5 points 1 week ago

That scares me greatly but I can't just stop taking my medicine, so what can I do but accept the risk?

[–] davehtaylor@beehaw.org 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

It seems ostensibly like it would be as easy as having an understanding enough of e.g. distilling, so that if you try to distill your own spirits, you know to discard the head and tail to avoid methanol poisoning. But this is so much more complex than that.

I think what it feels like is something akin to being trans and not having access to HRT, so you get hormones on the black market vs. trying to synthesize the hormones yourself from raw materials. I would support the former (though with a lot of research and making sure you're getting reputable supplies), but think the latter incredibly fraught for a layperson.

I think the real answer isn't DIY pharmaceuticals, but rather universal healthcare, informed consent, and a medical system (both physicians and pharmaceutical manufacturers) that puts patient care above any kind of profit motive

[–] LukeZaz@beehaw.org 5 points 1 week ago

I think the real answer isn’t DIY pharmaceuticals, but rather universal healthcare, informed consent, and a medical system (both physicians and pharmaceutical manufacturers) that puts patient care above any kind of profit motive

I think just about everyone here agrees. But the question is what to do until that becomes available. We need something in the interim; dangerous as this all is, I can't find it in me to shun it when the alternative is letting people suffer without access to anything as they desperately wait for a better society to emerge in some unknowable, possibly distant future.

[–] ijhoo@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

What can be used to detect impurities at those level? Maybe there is an additional machine needed that can also be built in a garage.

[–] becausechemistry@lemm.ee 2 points 1 week ago

The industry standard is HPLC (high performance liquid chromatography). Those things go for tens of thousands of dollars up front, plus maintenance and consumables.

If there was a less costly way of doing it, you bet companies would have settled on that by now.