Designer Drugs – Opiate Nation

(Translation into most languages at tab to the right.)

It’s a new year around the world. Most developed and industrialized nations have similar hopes and concerns. Yet when one travels outside of the USA, we find some striking differences in how other leading countries in the world govern themselves. This is obvious in one particular area – when it comes to what substances are legal, allowed, or illegal.

Kratom is a good example. It is a Thai traditional medicine. The plant is in the coffee family and when used traditionally – i.e., chewed or dried for tea – it can produce mild stimulant or sedative-like effects. (1) But in the last decade, people driven by greed and profit (it is a billion-dollar industry), have once again figured out how to chemically super-charge the derivatives in Kratom in order to create a market with a highly addictive substance in the guise of a “natural” product sold at convenience stores and gas stations in all but six states in the USA. These concentrated derivatives contain 7-hydroxymitragynine (7-OH), a powerful psychoactive compound that occurs naturally in tiny amounts in kratom. 7-OH affects the same receptors in the brain as morphine and heroin – thus, the same effects that people seek in those drugs. And in these new potencies, kratom has the same strong potential for addiction.

(Translation into most languages at tab to right)

Just when we thought everyone was aware of the fatal danger of fentanyl and it being mixed into every drug of abuse available on the street, a new threat arises. Nitazene or Isotonitazene (ISO) or Protonitazene, new lab-made opioids, are showing up at hospitals and morgues around the world in the bodies of people thinking they were taking their drug-of-choice only to find it was laced with one more deadly drug. It is being mixed in with cocaine, or formulated into fake Oxy’s and other pills. In the US, it first showed up in 2019 in the Midwest and spread rapidly.

Nitazenes were developed in the 1950’s by pharmaceutical companies as an alternative to morphine but shelved due to the risks of overdose. There is still no approved medical use for nitazenes today. Another ‘Designer Drug’ being made in illicit labs around the world, Nitazenes are up to 40 times stronger than fentanyl. Fentanyl is already 50 times more powerful than heroin and up to 800 times more powerful than morphine.

No wonder these drugs are referred to as ‘Frankenstein Opioids’ – only an insane, evil intentioned scientist would work to create such a drug. But in reality, the motivation is greed more than insanity because synthetic drugs are cheap to make and easy to ship and deliver – and highly profitable. But evil is the correct description for the immoral heads of the drug syndicates and cartels around the world whose entire life and business is dealing death.

What can be done?

For parents with children still at home, community connection and education are the best preventative measures. As I have said before, my husband and I were totally unaware of what substances were readily available to our middle school son in the early 2000’s. Our concern was smoking and marijuana. Little did we know. General discussions about drug abuse were the extent of our educational conversations. But we would have been much better prepared and had much more information if we had been involved with our kids’ school community. Instead, we were insulated from vital resources because we spent so much time with our church community. But make no mistake. Many of the families at church with kids in youth group were just like us – unaware and ill prepared and sadly many of them suffered the same loss as we did.

There are other important aspects in raising self-reliant kids who are not subject to the lures of the “cool” kids or “in” crowd. Below is a link to a previous blog dedicated to the perils modern teens and their parents face with important resources. I hope it will be helpful to you and those you love.