An unusual source of buying advice
FDA warning letters are written to vendors, not to customers. That makes them the most useful sourcing document available, because they describe what the agency actually found on real websites rather than what a vendor says about itself.
The Gram Peptides letter, issued 31 March 2026, is the clearest of the set. Three findings in it change how to read a product page.
1. Vendors rename compounds to evade detection
The letter documents retatrutide sold as "GLP-1-R peptide". Tirzepatide sold as "GLP-2 peptide", a name that refers to a real and entirely different hormone. Elsewhere, retatrutide sold as "GLP-3 RT", which is not a thing.
The practical consequence: a product name on a research-peptide site is not an identifier. If you cannot map the name to a compound with a known sequence, you cannot look up its evidence, its interactions or its half-life, and neither can anyone treating you in an emergency. Mass spectrometry identity confirmation on a batch COA is the only thing that closes this gap, which is the second time this module has landed on the same document.
2. "Research Use Only" does not do what vendors think
The disclaimer is on every research-peptide site: "for research purposes only", "not intended for human consumption". FDA addressed it directly, and the language is worth reading verbatim:
"Despite statements on your product labeling marketing your products for 'Research Use Only,' and 'not intended for human consumption'… evidence obtained from your website establishes that your products are intended to be drugs for human use."
Intended use is determined by the whole picture: how the product is described, what claims surround it, what it is sold alongside. A disclaimer contradicted by everything around it does not change the analysis. For a buyer, the takeaway is not legal; it is that the disclaimer signals nothing about quality, oversight or intent, and should carry no weight in your assessment of a supplier.
3. The bacteriostatic water sold next to it is also a drug
This is the finding almost nobody knows about. FDA stated, in three separate March 2026 warning letters, that bacteriostatic water sold alongside peptides is itself a drug:
"The sale of these products together demonstrates that you intend for your 'Bacteriostatic Water for Injection' to be used in combination for injection. Therefore, your 'Bacteriostatic Water for Injection' is a drug."
The diluent is not an accessory. It goes into your body, it carries a preservative, benzyl alcohol, which some people react to, and it is subject to the same sterility and quality questions as the powder. If you have been scrutinising the peptide COA and buying the water on price, you have been checking half the injection.
4. Dose ladders are being used as evidence
The Mile High Compounds letter cites the vendor's own "Peptide Cheat Sheet", including a retatrutide dose ladder, as part of the evidence that the products were intended as drugs for human use.
This is worth understanding as a reader, because it explains a framing you will see throughout this app. Publishing a dose ladder for a research-labelled compound is being treated by FDA as evidence of intended drug use. That is why every figure here is presented as a commonly researched range, not a recommendation, and why the vendor-tier label exists on figures that come only from affiliate pages. The distinction is not decoration.
The buyer's version, in four lines
A product name you cannot resolve to a known compound is a reason to stop. A "research use only" disclaimer tells you nothing about quality. Buy the diluent with the same scrutiny as the powder. And a vendor publishing confident dose protocols is telling you something about themselves, not about the compound.