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Investigating Mephedrone
April 12, 2010 by admin
Mephedrone
Cameron Francis investigates 4-methylmethcathinone.
As new drugs emerge from obscurity, it’s often the media that bring them into the limelight. Irresponsible media reporting of drug issues can have the dual impact of frightening parents and policy makers, while at the same time popularising a drug that might have otherwise remained on the fringes. And so here we are once again standing back watching as the media goes into overdrive about the emergence of a new drug, this time the drug is mephedrone. Alarming headlines such as: “Drug user ‘ripped off own scrotum’” (Evening Star 27/11/2009) sit alongside more alluring headlines like: “Legal online drugs providing real alternative to Class A substances” (Telegraph.co.uk – Mar 12, 2009).
Anyone working in the youth and drug and alcohol field knows that the media is no place to source accurate drug information. But how do we find out about this new drug and the possible health effects that might be relevant to the people we see in our work? This article is going to do some digging.
Let’s start at the beginning. Mephedrone is the commercial name for 4-methylmethcathinone, also known as M-Cat. It’s closely related to the illegal stimulants methcathinone and cathinone, the latter found in the Catha edulils plant, more commonly known as Khat. Khat has a long history of use mostly in Africa and the Middle East. Its leaves contain moderate amounts of cathinone, and when chewed it produces a stimulant effect. Cathinone is illegal in Queensland, as is the Khat plant.
By the late 1990s, there was an explosion of new or rediscovered drugs appearing on the internet. Most of these drugs were made popular because they weren’t always specifically illegal. Drug manufacturers were trying to stay one step ahead of the authorities, and get their product onto the market before it became illegal. Often these drugs were advertised as “legal highs”, and they were often linked to natural products, so that they appeared to be somehow “safer.” Mephedrone was one of many similar chemicals that came out of this environment through the late 1990s and into the 2000s. It first appeared in Australian news media in 2008 following a seizure of mephedrone capsules in Cairns. From the end of 2009 onwards, the media frenzy started, first in the UK and now all across the world.
So what’s the situation here in Queensland. Cathinone has been specifically illegal in Queensland for some time, and methcathinone was added to schedule 2 (the same as cannabis) more recently. Back in 2007, Queensland introduced an “analogue act” amendment to the Drugs Misuse Act (1987) which basically means any drug that is structurally simialr to an already illegal drug, is illegal by default. So it’s clear that mephedrone is illegal and people have been and will be charged for possessing and supplying.
But what about the health risks of mephedrone. Now it’s obvious that there’s not a huge amount of research into the effects of mephedrone. There’s a few early studies around, but nothing like the body of research that exists for something like MDMA or cannabis. This is what makes mephedrone such a risky option. We simply don’t know what the risks might be. And sadly, we often don’t understand the risks associated with some drugs until something bad happens.
So where are we up to in this process with mephedrone? Well, it’s hard to know but there’s a few trends coming to the fore from the user reports online and in some of the case reports in the peer reviewed literature. One thing that’s become quite evident from the UK (where mephedrone is currently legal, and freely available online) is that it seems to be quite addictive. There are plenty of reports of people binging on mephedrone, in much the same way as people binge on methamphetamine. It seems to be followed by a “crash” afterwards, with low mood and everything that goes with that. And also just like methamphetamine, there’s more and more cases appearing of mephedrone psychosis. This mostly seems to be in people who are using large doses and for long periods of time, but again, it’s early days.
A number of users have reported developing purple hands and feet after using mephedrone, even off single doses. One theory is that this is the result of peripheral vasoconstriction caused by a toxic by-product created by the liver as it breaks down mephedrone. It’s thought that a similar toxic metabolite is responsible for heart attacks that are starting to be reported. This is probably the biggest concern with mephedrone use at this early stage. There’s been a few deaths reported in Europe, but in these cases there have been other drugs involved or pre-existing medical conditions, making it difficult to assess the role of mephedrone.
Perhaps the most important piece of advice we can give young people who might be coming into contact with mephedrone is that we really don’t know what it’s capable of. Anyone who’s using mephedrone is in fact a guinea pig. There’s the very real risk that they might be the unfortunate one who uncovers some new side effect that no one had seen yet.
