Posting this because the summary going around does not say what the paper says, and the difference matters for how people here are using it.
Prices dramatically below market are the strongest single signal, and the reason is arithmetic rather than suspicion. Synthesis, testing, and cold-chain shipping have floors. A price well under the floor means something was skipped, and the two things that get skipped are testing and content.
Where I think it is weakest: the completion rate deserves as much attention as the headline, because a large effect among those who finished is a different claim from a large effect among those enrolled.
The bit I cannot resolve on my own is what a vetting checklist should actually contain, as opposed to a list of things that are easy to fake. Not looking for reassurance. Looking for the part I have got wrong.
Figures above are from the primary publication rather than the press summary. If a number here disagrees with one you have, post yours and we will work out which of us is reading a secondary source.
PharmD_Rodriguez said:Prices dramatically below market are the strongest single signal, and the reason is arithmetic rather than suspicion.
Agreeing with PharmD_Rodriguez, and the qualification matters more than the agreement. The pattern that distinguishes a bad batch from an exit is behaviour rather than product. A bad batch comes with communication, a reshipment offer and a batch number. An exit comes with slower replies, pressure toward less reversible payment methods, sudden discounting, and the same reassurance repeated without any new information. The product tells you less than the correspondence does.
That is the short version; the long version is somebody else's post.
PharmD_Rodriguez said:Prices dramatically below market are the strongest single signal, and the reason is arithmetic rather than suspicion.
I disagree that testing history is decisive. It tells you what a supplier did when they were being watched. Continuity of behaviour under stress — a late shipment, a failed test, a complaint — is more predictive than any run of good results.
Sigma-Aldrich — Research-Grade Standards
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Shop Reference StandardsTaking the question as asked, rather than the general version of it. The useful checklist is about verifiability rather than presentation. Independent test results commissioned by buyers rather than by the seller, consistency across multiple batches over time rather than one flattering report, a physical address and a company registration that resolve, batch and lot numbers on the actual labelling, and a shipping practice that matches what the material needs. Everything a good-looking website provides is cheap to fake; none of the items above are.
Ask again with the specifics and you will get a better answer than this one.
LarryQC_SD said:The pattern that distinguishes a bad batch from an exit is behaviour rather than product.
Same position here, arrived at the long way round. One addition: an unstated method makes a report close to uninterpretable. "99% pure" without the technique, the standard and the conditions is a claim, not a measurement.