The Forecast

There have been plenty of stories about newer legal drugs floating around that kids have been getting into so they can subvert the system. K2 and Salvia are the ones I have heard the most about, but I am sure there are more. Like Ecstasy, it will only be matter of time before they are outlawed but a lot of people are going to be harmed before that happens.


The newest one I have heard of around here is called Blizzard. It is apparently a no more than a bath salt that has fallen into favor in the drug crowds. For the time, it is legal and can be bought at large chains that sell bath products. For their benefit, I will not mention any names. As the form Blizzard which is very finely ground and packaged in small jars labeled as such, this is probably more likely found in head shops, but it is not hard to get a mortar and pestle to grind up the legitimate version if one does not have access to such an establishment. I would have never heard of it either, but word of this sort of thing worked its way to me via my patients, like so many other tidbits of information. The recent story on the death of a Blizzard IV drug user has increased its notoriety since then. I have been told that some states have become more aware of this becoming a problem and are making steps to ban the product. Much like Ecstasy, K2 and Salvia, these compounds will have their heyday before being recognized and regulated. The compound is not harmless and more people are sure to die from use of this product.


While it is not funny, do you not just want to say "are you completely stupid, or just mostly stupid?" when you hear that someone shot up their veins with BATH SALTS? Still I wonder since it is a cleansing type product is the user less likely to get an infection than, say a heroin user? At least they will smell spring fresh.


Of course there was the bath salts as a drug discussion that came up at lunchtime the first time that Blizzard was introduced to the psychiatric unit here. How is it used? Are there different scents? It is not that our lunchtime discussions do not reach the lowest common denominator of poor taste to begin with, but since this is likely to hit the teenage set out of its sheer accessibility, we pondered if were likely to be used the way high school students use to get drunk during school- the vodka enema. Useful if one can squeeze really tight for a long time. Unfortunately, this form of alcohol delivery has been implicated in a good number of cases of alcohol poisoning. Nonetheless, it is easier than trying to sneak a bottle of vodka into school so the practice continues. Would not a bath salt enema be a great way to pull off a buzz, avoid track marks and leave one's colon smelling fresh? They might even expand the practice into one of those colonic type spas where one could choose the size of the buzz- flurries, light accumulation, a clipper or the full blown blizzard.


So that was the main topic of discussion during lunch in the conference room yesterday- bath salt enemas. I do not wish to make light of the tragic loss of a young person's life, but if people are stupid enough to do something as stupid as shoot up bath salts, we are going to joke. Our jobs are stressful enough that we need a break sometime.