Tusk cracks down on designer drugs ("dopalacze") in Poland

PM Tusk has ordered a nationwide crackdown on shops selling smart drugs, aka designer drugs, memory enhancers or noothropic substances. What is the situation like in other countries? I am told these are worse than mainline drugs (grass, ampha, coke, etc.) because medical rescuers don't always know which smart drug was used, what it contained and how to deal with its health- and life-threatening effects.

Most if not all of them are rather tame - no medical rescuers needed - though extremely popular in Poland. Shame he doesn't crack down on cheap vodka.

I would worry more about fraud. Do these drugs really work? If they don't, millions of people are throwing away their money. Buyer beware.

We have energy drinks, herbal suppliments, mineral and vitamin suppliments. Some are "memory enhancing" and have gingko, while others are "sexual enhancing". There's an enhancement for damn near everything these days.

Good for him..

Designer drugs can hardly be comapred to energy drinks when they lead to cases of poisoning and even death!

There's a very big difference between designer dugs and the herbal whatevers that those shops sell. Designer drugs can indeed be dangerous, herbal substitutes aren't.

They sell BZP, which is 100% synthetic.

Now that I finally got over a tea tray-like display of many flavors of K2 and K3 "insence" in my neighborhood convenience strore, a new product showed up: a rejuvenating "bath salts" - a little ceramic container with a custom combination of legal stimulants in white powder form!

That is how they are sold over here, probably BZP. In the US it's already on the "same as heroin" list.

that's dissapointing.. not as humorous as putting some caffeine in a white powder form..
Still, every individual is responsible for that they injest, unless the manufacturer tries to hide what they put in their products.
And then again, the way we deal with addicts borders on humorous too - like when we see somebody hitting themselves repeatedly with the hammer, we would rather deal with the hammer..

they already proved that there is no wuch things like cayenne pepper extract or dragon fly extract in so called herbal highs. they 100% syntethic. When I've opened the Spice packedge I smelled the horrible smell of shoe glue which was covered by vanilla aroma... Herbal! Yeah, right! ;DDD


They do.


Yes.

what are the "dopalacze"? are those the drugs Polinius3 mentioned? how come it was used to be sold freely in Poland?

To be honest, the effects of these designer drugs are mild in comparison to that of alcohol, the only difference being that we've had an intimate relationship with the latter for many thousands of years. The main worry with designer drugs is indeed the lack of purity, given that it's in the hands of some rather dodgy black-market entrepeneurs. However, it's almost impossible to control because as soon as one chemical is banned, another pops up in replacement with a minor alteration to the same formula. Ad infinitum. I have no idea how to respond to it though, it's a catch-22.

So Southern is right on the other thread - Poles do have artificially high IQs

; )

Hahaha, mystery solved ;)

which ones? What products? Do tell!
See, that's what so wonderful about the internet. If you research, you can find everything about the product you're about to injest, including the first hand, both positive and negative ratings. Pay attention to the sources, though, if it is a pill, for example, you'll have to wade through tons of pharmaceutical advertizing..

yes


it's freely sell in whole world.
It because somebody come to the great idea of inventing new subsrances which works like common drugs and sell it in producs which are marked: nie do spożycia przez ludzi. Officaily dopalacze are registered as collection products (produkt kolekcjonerki) or plant fertilizers (nawozy dla roślin).

It produced nice slang fraces such as: "włożyć coś do klasera"... ;>

No one knows the substances those drugs includes so they can't be delegilised quickly. Authorities needs to identify substances first then they can ban it. Of course first generation of those pills (containing mostly BZP) were identified and banned but the producer just get rid off those products and replaced it with another unidentified substance.


what about mephedrone?


are we talking about the same things? Man on my dopalacze the product list was soemthing like: herbals, aminoacids, cayenne pepper. there was no sides effects leaflet or what it contains but i agree everyone knows it can be harmful and everyone takes it on their own risk.

So they are not marked as harmless miracles!
Sometimes, you can just see Darwin's theory at work. ;)

These drugs are generally more similar to stimulants and psychedelics (i.e. ecstasy and LSD respectively), so it's difficult to compare really. My point was really just that we're so used to the effects of alcohol, that we're really unaware of just how strong it is. Sure, I would agree that psychedelics have more of a "mind-altering" effect on a user than alcohol, but that the negative social consequences are almost certainly much less, as are addictive levels and personal physical danger. It just depends on what you value most basically.

Regarding mephedrone specifically, it's like a weak ecstasy/cocaine hybrid, or a strong caffeine buzz. I wouldn't personally consider it to be dangerous at all, but stupid things/injuries are naturally going to result from its consumption at some time, just as they do from that of alcohol.

I live in £ódź and nearby I have 4 smart shops. When I'm passing by I see even in mornings a group of people waiting to open the store. It really looks creepy.


Well once I've seen a teller one of smartshops on mephedrone. He looked and behaved like on relly good speed...


Yes but kids and young people tend to experiment even if the thing is something risky. It has nothing to do with intelligence but with being young. What would you say if you're kids were taking it? Would you still talk about Darwin's theory ar work?

Isn't it true that they have to outlaw new drugs by primary legislation instead of delegated? i.e. there's a big time delay

Not sure on this.

Yeah, although I may have come across as pro-drug legalisation, I'm actually not at all, I'm just pro-facts. The problem is not so much the drugs, as it is human disposition and the psychological effects of drug culture. I do think some drugs could be useful to people though, but there's always a potential for abuse and gratification.

I find it creepy that you have smart shops there. The concept is just weird to me, over here we have a pretty solid "DON'T DO DRUGS. AT ALL" policy.


Yeah, speed, cocaine, ecstasy, they're all somewhere pretty high on the stimulants spectrum....

Where do you live? And how do you know you don't have them?


Yes but our state shows that they can act illegally.
Being serious none of the drugs which are in use now are not delegalised... they just investigate them as someone died recently.

England (but moving to Poland soon), and I know because - in addition to the fact that I've never seen one - if they did exist, going out at night here would probably be a hell of a lot safer. As it is, drug-related crime is a major problem, and a big part of this is probably the fact that a lot of these minor drugs are illegal.

You can't always use the kids as an excuse. I have learned from my son's teen years that most of the time, the stuff that is illegal is much cooler to them.

Interestingly, his theory on this K2 explosion and is that the old hippies are being ridiculous because they are getting old and scared of the law.

Hadn't heard the term smart shop before - if it's the same as 'head shop' which is what they were known as in Ireland (we sell 'legal highs', herbal stuff, strange pills that haven't just been banned in this jurisdiction yet, smoking parephenalia etc) then that particular niche has recently been extinguished as these shops were banned here in recent months.

However, they were pretty popular.

I'd educate them about it, instead of demonizing it. Educate those kids and let them know that they need to get their life in order before they can do things like drugs, go on vacations, sit around and play playstation all day. I think that society sets the bar way too low for kids and tries to babysit them all the way through life. A little bit of responsibility goes a long way.

@Teffle Ahh, I see what you mean, I thought you meant slightly more serious stuff. The only time I've ever seen anything like what you described anywhere other than the internet was at T in the Park some time ago, where mushrooms seemed to be the big seller.


A very good post, I completely agree.

Well it depends what you mean. Some of the stuff in the Head Shops here was serious enough - BZP etc.

Although still not entirely sure that head shop = smart shop - but it seems to.

BZP isn't exactly all that serious...