Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 16

Thread: The Street Drug Krokidil hits US

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Sep 2009
    Location
    Slave Region 10
    Posts
    113,807

    Default The Street Drug Krokidil hits US

    First cases of flesh-eating drug Krokodil surface in US

    Published September 26, 2013FoxNews.com


    • A man prepares heroin in Zhukovsky, Russia, near Moscow. To produce krokodil, which has a comparable effect to heroin but is much cheaper to make, users mix codeine with gasoline, paint thinner, iodine, hydrochloric acid and red phosphorous. (Reuters)

    • My Fox Phoenix

    Next Slide Previous Slide


    Krokodil, a flesh-eating drug which first surfaced in Russia more than a decade ago, has reportedly been found in the United States.
    Similar to morphine or heroin, krokodil is made by mixing codeine with substances like gasoline, paint thinner, oil or alcohol. That mixture is then injected into a vein, potentially causing an addict's skin to turn greenish, scaly and eventually rot away.
    Dr. Frank LoVecchio, co-medical director at Banner Good Samaritan Poison and Drug Information Center in Arizona, told CBS5 that the first two cases of people using the drug have been reported in the state. He declined to comment on the patients' conditions.
    "As far as I know, these are the first cases in the United States that are reported," LoVecchio said, adding that the cases are believed to be linked. "So we're extremely frightened."
    Users of krokodil — or desomorphine — had previously only been found in large numbers in Russia, where 65 million doses of the opiate were seized during the first three months of 2011, Russia's Federal Drug Control Service told Time.
    "This is really frightening," Dr. Aaron Skolnik, a toxicologist at Banner Good Samaritan Poison and Drug Information Center told MyFoxPhoenix.com. "This is something we hoped would never make it to the U.S. because it's so detrimental to the people who use it."
    To produce the potentially deadly drug, which has a comparable effect to heroin but is much cheaper to make, users mix codeine with gasoline, paint thinner, iodine, hydrochloric acid and red phosphorous. Codeine, a controlled substance in the United States used to treat mild to moderate pain, is widely available over the counter in Russia.
    In 2010, up to a million people, according to various estimates, were injecting the resulting substance into their veins in Russia, thus far the only country worldwide to see it grow into an epidemic, Time reports.
    The drug's sinister moniker — also known as crocodile — refers to the greenish and scaly appearance of a user's skin at the site of injection as blood vessels rupture and cause surrounding tissues to die. According to reports, the drug first appeared in Siberia and parts of Russia around 2002, but has spread throughout the country in recent years.
    Officials at the Washington-based National Institute on Drug Abuse told FoxNews.com in 2011 that they had not heard of the drug prior to an inquiry by FoxNews.com.
    Dr. Ellen Marmur, chief of dermatological and cosmetic surgery at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City, told FoxNews.com in 2011 she had never seen any cases involving krokodil, but said it reminded her of "skin popping," or when intravenous drug users inject a substance directly into their skin due to damaged veins.
    "This looks to me a lot like skin popping, what drug users used to do back in the day with heroin and other drugs," Marmur said. "It just kills the skin, that's what you're seeing, big dead pieces of skin."
    Those large pieces of dead skin are referred to as eschars, Marmur said, leaving the user prone to infection, amputation and other complications.
    Marmur said at the time that she was concerned the drug could eventually make its way into the United States.
    "It's horrible," she continued. "These people are the ultimate in self-destructive drug addiction. Once you're an addict at this level, any rational thinking doesn't apply."
    Dr. Lewis Nelson, a medical toxicologist at Bellevue Hospital Center in New York, also said in 2011 that he doubted krokodil would reach the United States due to the availability of other cheap, powerful drugs such as black tar heroin and Oxycontin.
    "It's not going to become a club drug, I can guarantee you that," he said.
    They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
    “As a general rule, the earlier you recognize someone is trying to kill you, the better off you’ll be.”

    "You think a wall as solid as the earth separates civilisation from barbarism. I tell you the division is a sheet of glass."



  2. #2
    Join Date
    Oct 2009
    Location
    WA Coast
    Posts
    4,774

    Default

    Be afraid! Support the drug war! Those people are shooting up gasoline!

    When will we begin to hear about the Krokodil Babies?


  3. #3
    Join Date
    Aug 2010
    Location
    American South
    Posts
    16,633

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by dissimulo View Post
    Be afraid! Support the drug war! Those people are shooting up gasoline!

    When will we begin to hear about the Krokodil Babies?
    Usually I look forward to your comments on topics concerning health and biology, but this is a little mysterious. Is your point that the Kroc problem is self correcting, or are you serious?

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Feb 2009
    Location
    Beautiful Lakes & Mountains of East TN
    Posts
    5,177

    Default

    I would assume it's a dig at the "war on drugs" and now that we're even more horrified about drugs that people are doing we should step up the war on drugs even more.

    And think of the children who will be born addicted to krokodil...we MUST do something!

    That's my take on it, and that's what I took away from Dis' post.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    May 2009
    Posts
    7,750

    Default

    This man has a particularly advanced habit...

    Europe used to have empires. They were run by emperors.
    Then we had kingdoms. They were run by kings.
    Now we have countries...

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Nov 2007
    Posts
    24,791

    Default

    meth and krokidil are freaky drugs. i saw a documentary on it, and i don't not understand why someone would do that voluntarily


    the babies hooked on drugs make me angry as they have had NO choice in the matter, and we should help them (and i mean truly help them)

    that said....

    war on drugs or not, if someone wants to do those, they will find a way
    float like a butterfly...

    <img src=http://www.thetreeofliberty.com/vb/image.php?s=fd42b01563865e774f96446ef657fe33&type=sigpic&userid=769&dateline=1223824178 border=0 alt= />
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    highly functional, paranoid, tinfoiler
    currently in charge of the aluminatorium

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Oct 2009
    Location
    WA Coast
    Posts
    4,774

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Godwit View Post
    Usually I look forward to your comments on topics concerning health and biology, but this is a little mysterious. Is your point that the Kroc problem is self correcting, or are you serious?
    Yeah, mostly we create these problems by outlawing substances that are much less harmful and causing the black market to produce products that reduce production and distribution risks.

    The slides in the article are what I have come to expect from TV news drug hysteria, like the part where they list the things that the drug makers "mix." It is not as if the users are shooting up gasoline and red phosphorus and the journalists who wrote the article are probably well aware of that. The producers are reacting codeine using some organic solvents and other chemicals to produce desomorphine.

    These stories often seem to be designed to produce a reaction, which is to outlaw the latest drug, but that just continues to raise the stakes and put more concentrated, damaging, and foolish drugs on the market. Why not just make opium legal again? In comparison, it is extremely safe.


  8. #8
    Join Date
    Sep 2009
    Location
    Slave Region 10
    Posts
    113,807

    Default Joke Time Is Over, worse pics at link

    They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
    “As a general rule, the earlier you recognize someone is trying to kill you, the better off you’ll be.”

    "You think a wall as solid as the earth separates civilisation from barbarism. I tell you the division is a sheet of glass."



  9. #9
    AUnut is offline Tree of Liberty Supporter
    Join Date
    Sep 2008
    Posts
    2,279

    Default

    I have been reading about this for a few years. Desomorphine....I think I will take a pass....The videos on youtube are unbelievable!

    AUnut
    Pro is the opposite of con, that is easily seen. So if progress is to move forward, what does congress mean? - Nipsey Russell

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Aug 2008
    Location
    timber missouri
    Posts
    20,314

    Thumbs up

    Quote Originally Posted by dissimulo View Post
    Yeah, mostly we create these problems by outlawing substances that are much less harmful and causing the black market to produce products that reduce production and distribution risks.

    The slides in the article are what I have come to expect from TV news drug hysteria, like the part where they list the things that the drug makers "mix." It is not as if the users are shooting up gasoline and red phosphorus and the journalists who wrote the article are probably well aware of that. The producers are reacting codeine using some organic solvents and other chemicals to produce desomorphine.

    These stories often seem to be designed to produce a reaction, which is to outlaw the latest drug, but that just continues to raise the stakes and put more concentrated, damaging, and foolish drugs on the market. Why not just make opium legal again? In comparison, it is extremely safe.
    qft...
    nemophilist.




Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •