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Avoiding the emergency department if you use mephedrone
Fact 1 Over 80% of A+E presentations involving mephedrone also involve alcohol
Tip 1 Keep your alcohol drinking down (5 units) and stay well hydrated with water or juice
Fact 2 The more mephedrone you use and the longer your session is the more likely you are to experience problems
Tip 2 Keep your doses down (best under 1/2gram a session) and keep your session short
Fact 3 Injecting mephedrone is by far the most risky way of using.
Tip 3 Avoid injecting but if you do always use a clean works and dispose of it in a sharps box
Fact 4 If you feel depressed before you start using mephedrone your comedown will be really bad
Tip 4 Avoid using when you feel down, depressed or anxious or if you are on any medication for your mood, heart or brain.
Fact 5 Most A+E presentations involving mephedrone also involve other drugs especially ketamine, cocaine and E
Tip 5 Avoid using other stimulant (cocaine, E, amphetamine) drugs with mephedrone
Fact 6 Most people who have a bad time with mephedrone can feel things starting to go wrong but carry on taking more instead of stopping
Tip 6 If you start to feel agitated, angry, frightened, really paranoid, hot, or confused, or start to feel your race away or get chest pain or hear or see things then stop using immediately. The sooner you stop the sooner you’ll feel back to normal. If you don’t feel better after a little while get help.
Fact 7 Most people who have used mephedrone who turn up to A+E have mates that probably could have got them to slow down or stop before it got really bad.
Tip 7 Don’t be afraid to say something and look out for your mates
McDeadly Ecstasy pills on the scene
Deadly ecstasy pills sporting the Golden Arches MacDonald’s logo have been seized in Scotland, all containing para-methoxy-amphetamine (PMA) – a strong psychedelic and killer ecstasy substitute.
The price of ecstasy pills is on the rise and there is increasing belief that the quantity of MDMA in pills is increasing, but this deadly seizure reminds us that pills vary widely in composition – and there are pills out there you do not want to try.
If only ecstasy pills were as consistent as a Big Mac!
PMA closely related to PMMA, has been connected to a number of deaths over the last decade in Canada, the US, Europe and Australia. While PMA was initially thought to be a by-product created in the production of MDMA, this is unlikely given the different precursors that each requires for their production.
A delayed onset of effect (often more than 2 hours) can lead to inadvertent overdosing – thinking ‘these pills are crap, better take another one of two and see if we get something’. However it can lead to muscle spasms, burred vision, overheating (hyperthermia), and increases in pulse and blood pressure.
Nausea and vomiting can lead to loss of potassium leading to hypokalemia (low potassium levels) which combined with hyperthermia can lead to irregular heart rhythms, seizures and death – see more on taking new pills here.
So if someone offers you a pill with the Macca’s logo on it – believe use you won’t be ‘lovin it’.
Spliff Styles- How do you roll? by Will Coldwell
If there’s one thing about smoking cannabis that is guaranteed not come with unwanted side effects, then it has to be rolling. Satisfying, engaging and much more creative than ordering a 50/50 pizza instead of a margherita or the inevitable all day cartoon-fest, the art of rolling has almost as much potential to get someone hooked as the drug itself.
Interestingly, smokers from around the world seem to adopt different styles of rolling. While spending time working for Time Out Amsterdam, engaging in the privileged task of writing Coffee shop reviews courtesy of the expense account, I had a chance to observe these various techniques, as demonstrated by pot-smoking tourists burning time in the ‘global-village’. I wouldn’t like to comment on what it says about the various cultural identities, but it’s interesting all the same.
The Dutch
Lets start with the Dutch style, well planned, serious, and big. Using the whole roach card to make a sturdy filter, notable for the folded Z-shape in the middle, these spliffs are chunky and coned. They are also filled with twice as much weed as you need, mixed with cigarette tobacco to help it burn longer.
Any pre-rolled joint you will find in a Dutch coffeeshop is rolled like this and if you do get lucky and spot a Dutch person actually in one, then you’ll find them rolling theirs the very same way. You could say it’s a design classic.
Read more
Are Students Really Britain’s Biggest Binge Drinkers?
Global Drug Survey conducted the largest ever drug survey with over 15,000 people taking part. From Angola to Australia and Sweden to South Africa, the most comprehensive and contextual information on worldwide drug use was outlined. Drug users told us about the ‘k-hole’, about the cost of luxury cocaine and the quality of mephedrone. 39.5 % of those who filled out the survey were students and they told us something very interesting- students are in fact quite sensible drinkers! Read more
Get some feed back on your drug use
Want some feedback on your drug use ? Want to know how much you spend? If your use is average? or even how much you use in a year ? Head over to http://drugsmeter.com/ to find out !
Successful interventions with new psychoactive substances- by Katy McCleod
While conducting training on new psychoactive substances throughout Scotland, I often get asked which interventions are the most effective for users of these substances. I recently came across the paper by the fabulous Dr Adam Winstock: New recreational drugs and the primary care approach to patients who use them (Winstock and Mitcheson, 2012) which provides insightful guidance on working with users. The paper can be downloaded for free at- Global Drug Survey Academic Articles.
Dr Adam Winstock is involved in some rather exciting projects connected to new psychoactive substances, namely the Global Drugs Survey published in Mixmag in March of every year and the brand new drugs meter app, more info can be found at http://globaldrugsurvey.com/ You can even catch him speaking at Crew’s national event CREWSUS in Perth later this month! Read more
Pow ! to Meow Meow ?
Mephedrone or ‘Meow Meow’ as the media labelled it, was banned in Britain in April 2010- lets look at the effects this had on use, quality and price.
According to last year’s Mixmag survey, 75% of people said they had taken mephedrone since the ban (April 15th 2010) with a third of them saying the ban had no effect. A mere 10% had said use had increased while others were using Cocaine and Ecstasy instead. Read more
Anything is possible on the Silk Road- by Monica Barratt
Much of the research and discussion about drugs and the internet has focused upon either buying drugs online or seeking drug-related information online. News coverage has particularly focused upon the capacity to buy drugs from web vendors (eg, Psychedelic drugs just a click away online, Deadly drug on the net).Yet, evidence from the last decade indicates that most drug transactions still occur in the traditional way.
Popular illegal drugs are not generally available online: unless the product can be marketed as ‘legal’ or ‘not for human consumption’, the legal risk and practical problems associated with selling heroin, MDMA, amphetamines, and cannabis through an online marketplace are just too big, for both buyers and sellers.
Yet, evidence from the last decade indicates that most drug transactions still occur in the traditional way.
MDMA Quality – Up or Down ?
Last years Mixmag’s result’s indicated that the perceived quality of MDMA has gone down. According to the infographic below the quality of pills and powder has improved.
According to Dr. John Ramsey, a UK toxicologist “MDMA is back in tablets. Analysis of drugs seized from this year’s music festivals has shown that “ecstasy” tablets are now much more likely to contain MDMA than the strange mixtures of piperazines (BZP, TFMPP, CPP) that have been common for the past couple of years. A sample of about twenty tablets of various designs were analysed and contained 52 – 115mg MDMA (as free base) with the majority around 100mg per tablet.
Quite pure crystal MDMA is still commonplace but for the first time we encountered sucrose (sugar) crystals in wraps in amnesty bins presumably to be passed off as MDMA. They are very convincing and require analysis to differentiate the two”.
The current state of MDMA- Assisted Psychotherapy- by Stephen Bright
Before 3,4 -methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) became popular as a recreational drug known as Ecstasy, it was used effectively in psychotherapy to enhance relationships and buffer fear reactions.
After emergency scheduling by the Drug Enforcement Agency in 1985, MDMA was made illegal in the USA on November 13, 1986. Other countries quickly followed the USA’s lead. This forced MDMA onto the black market, which negatively affected the quality and purity of Ecstasy. In addition, it meant research examining the effectiveness of MDMA as a psychotherapeutic tool was politically blocked. Read more