Eva Ruiz |
Seville (EFE).- Forensic experts have warned this Thursday that the new emerging drugs, known as “psychoactives”, can cause death if consumed even in small quantities, which is why they constitute “a public health problem”.
This was confirmed to EFE by the doctor from the National Institute of Toxicology and Forensic Sciences Violeta del Fresno, a participant in the VII National Congress of the Spanish Society of Forensic Pathology (SEPAF) held in Seville in which these “drugs of the future”.
He has specified that it is a “very varied” group of substances with “much heterogeneity of structures and mechanisms of action” and that, although they are not the most prevalent in consumption, “they do represent a significant public health risk.” .
Therefore, cocaine and cannabis continue to be consumed in greater quantities, but the problem -explains the doctor- appears when these substances are adulterated and, “because they are structurally modified, they have a more powerful mechanism of action and it is easier for a poisoning”.
Attractive and easy to buy
Del Fresno explains that these products include synthetic cathinones derived from amphetamines, piperazines that mimic the effects of ecstasy, tryptamines, synthetic cannabinoids or new generation benzodiazepines.
The common characteristic to all of them is that they are easy to acquire. “If anyone does an internet search, they can buy them,” says the expert, who adds that “they put very striking colors and names on them and it works like a store with a shopping cart,” which becomes an “attractive” process. .
They are presented “as if they were something more harmless”, with names such as “bath salts” or “spicy”, as well as “an alternative to illegal drugs”, for which the experts call, in addition to not consuming this type of substances, “not to buy through these types of channels and routes because you do not know what you are buying”.
He has given as an example that, when analyzes have been carried out, there have been occasions in which the person has reported having consumed a substance and “then in the laboratory that one is not seen but another appears, which can be much more powerful”.
“It really is dangerous, it’s not a game and you have to be careful with these substances that can cause the death of a person even in small concentrations”, said the doctor, who added that “since they are so new, there are not many data regarding toxicity” and that “there is no safe range” for their consumption.
Continuous appearance on the market
The coroner has specified that new substances of this type appear “continuously” on the market because clandestine laboratories make small modifications and release new products that are not controlled.
“Investigation requires processes and procedures that are slower than what the laboratory takes in manufacturing, which is much faster,” says Del Fresno, who explains that those who trade with them “play with the fact that they are not supervised and that they have received popularity”.
In recent years, the number of seizures of these products has decreased, but with a greater quantity of emerging drugs manufactured, just as the place from which they are made has varied since clandestine laboratories, which tended to be in Asia, India and China, Now they are moving to Europe.
In Spain, moreover, the situation is similar to that of other European countries, with the Nordics and the United Kingdom leading the way in detecting and reporting findings, which are gradually advancing and spreading to the rest of the continent.
The experts have a new ally in artificial intelligence since there are tools that “will make it possible to predict what type of substances can be synthesized.”
“Right now we do not work with them but it is innovative that through algorithms it can be estimated how many substances can arise from the basic structure from which it starts,” he pointed out.