A Psychedelic Ban Would Disrupt Important Research
You have probably never heard of 2,5-dimethoxy-4-iodoamphetamine (DOI), much less worried about its possible abuse. Yet the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) wants to ban this synthetic psychedelic, a promising research chemical used in more than 900 published studies, by placing it in Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), which defeated a previous DEA attempt to ban DOI in 2022, is determined to stop the agency’s interference with science again.
A DEA administrative law judge has scheduled a 10-day hearing on the proposed ban, beginning on November 12. SSDP, which filed a prehearing statement on behalf of more than 20 scientists, argues that placing DOI in Schedule I would impose “onerous financial and bureaucratic obstacles on researchers.” SSDP also opposes the scheduling of another psychedelic, 2,5-dimethoxy-4-chloroamphetamine (DOC), under the same proposed rule, which the DEA published last December.
“DOI and DOC are important research chemicals with basically no evidence of abuse,” says SSDP alum and legal counsel Brett Phelps. Phelps is working with Denver attorney Robert Rush, who represents University of California, Berkeley, neuroscientist Raul Ramos.
“The DEA’s attempt to classify DOI, a compound of great significance to both psychedelic and fundamental serotonin research, as a Schedule I substance exemplifies an administrative agency overstepping its bounds,” Rush says. “The government admits DOI is not being diverted for use outside of scientific research yet insists on placing this substance in such a restricted class that it will disrupt virtually all current research.”
SSDP describes the two compounds as “essential research chemicals in pre-clinical psychiatry and neurobiology,” noting that their unscheduled status has made them accessible as tools for studying serotonin receptors. It says DOI, in particular, has been “a cornerstone in neuroscience research” due to its selectivity for the 5-HT2A serotonin receptor, crucial for understanding the therapeutic effects of psychedelics. Scientists have used DOI to “ma
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