Passing it through a 0.22 filter does not make it sterile lol...just bacteria free? I don't know why that is a prevailing thought in this community.
It doesn't make any sense to me. If ur worried about filtering out bacteria there is a bigger problem at hand a filter won't save you from an unsafe vial. Just toss it if u visibly see something floating in ur recon'd vial
If there is bacteria and other contaminants in ur vial you will still contract some type of reaction bc the filter won't catch endos or viruses, misfolded peps, contamination from synthesis etc.
In the lab we use filters bc we are ASSUMING what we are handling is sterile, and it's just a failsafe to remove bacteria bc it's easy to contaminate whatever ur handling w/ur hands or even breath. We don't think it's not sterile from the jump. Think of filtering as a minimizing contamination technique, it's not a decontamination technique.
Sterile means the absence of living organism. It doesn’t mean “free from all contaminants”. That’s why “sterile water” doesn’t make it safe for injecting unless it specifies “for injection”, which is a higher standard defined by USP.
.22um filtration removes all viable bacteria. It’s called “sterile filtration” for that reason and one of the final steps (usually one of several) before filling injector pens in pharma peptide production meant as a safeguard against any earlier failure to prevent bacterial contamination.
It doesn’t remove virii, though it’s unlikely any could survive in a lyophiiized peptide vial, and it doesn’t remove endotoxin (which are evidence bacteria are or were present at some point, only emphasizing why one should always sterile filter). But the risk presented by bacteria is far larger than endotoxin.
Nearly 5% of peptide samples submitted to Jano fail sterility testing, and that’s only testing for the 5 most common types of bacteria. Since subQ injections are going into the area where immune surveillance is most active, it’s understandable why small amounts of bacteria aren’t causing noticeable issues. But that doesn’t mean someone’s luck won’t run out at some point, either by being exposed to something their immune system isn’t up to defending against, or that the cumulative load of many asymptomatic injections of bacteria isn’t causing some long term damage that’s not easily attributable to them. There’s some evidence bacteria from “dirty” injections can accumulate in joints, where they are out of the reach of immune cells, and take advantage of a weakened immune system later, or just cause arthritis (something observed to happen at exponentially higher rates in people who injected street drugs at some point in their lives).
The idea that either you “trust” the product enough to use it without filtering, or don’t use it at all is a flawed approach with UGL drugs.
Telling a heroin user they should stop using is both obvious and ineffective. Meeting them where they are by offering clean injection gear is far more likely to lower the harm they’re exposed to.
Harm reduction is about reducing risk, not eliminating it. Filtering absolutely reduces risk.