1. 4 (news)
kara harris & riley murphy
managing editor ‘12
Students that have done the synthetic drug called Demon explain that they feel anxious, make themselves hallucinate or believe freightening
things that aren’t there. Since summer of 2011, synthetic drugs have began to increase in popularity amongst teenagers outside of school.
They may be “fake” but the effects of synthetic
drugs are just as evident as the real substances
Illustration by Megan Levy
A
ugust 1, 2011
the synthetic
drug JWH 018
was banned.
Even though
the drug was
deemed illegal,
m a n u f a c t u r e r s
found their ways around the law by
making slight changes in the chemical
make-up.
The state police and some other
information networks sent out some
things saying ‘this is a new thing that’s
going on around the Detroit area,” officer
Jeremy Davis said. “A few of the hospitals
have ran into this, keep your eyes open.’
And then it was within a month that we
started having some situations pop up
around here, just limited, not that severe.
But then over the summer it kinda just
exploded.”
While synthetic drugs have become a
problem, there seems to be little to no use
of synthetics at school.
“What I’ve heard is that they are becoming
a problem outside of the school,” assistant
principal Kandis Pritchett said. “But inside
of the school I haven’t seen anyone under
the influence of synthetic drugs or had
anyone report anything to me.”
Synthetic drugs in all forms started to
circulate around Midland area at the start
of summer in 2011, becoming an issue with
all age groups.
“Nobody knows what you’re doing, but
it’s messing you up. It says right on the
package, not for human consumption and
is sold as incense,” Davis said.
“They come like foil wrapped packets that
are vacuum sealed, mostly from the foreign
countries since its legal there,” paramedic
Jay Anderson said.
Even though synthetic drugs are
packaged with a warning, people continue
to use them. A student, who only agreed to
speak to the paper if their names were not
metntioned, has smoked synthetic cannabis
over 30 times since the start of the summer.
“Well, my first experience I was in
McDonalds parking lot, after school one
day and it was demon (a type of synthetic
drug),” Tiffany* said. “I was freaking out
and everything was numb around me,
I couldn’t hear and I couldn’t feel my
fingertips. It was kind of like a euphoria
feeling, like being high and drunk. And
then it got kinda scary because people were
messing with me, and making me think I
was talking to myself.”
The appeal to most teenagers with
synthetic drugs is that they are less likely to
get caught using them.
“I know that it doesn’t show up on
drug tests,” Tiffany said. “It’s made from
potpourri and natural substances, derived
from natural elements, and I’m all for that,
so it was a ‘why not’ kinda thing.”
While some students enjoy the natural
elements in the synthetic drugs, some forced
themselves to like it just to enjoy their high.
“I started doing them my junior year a
couple weeks after I got on probation,”
Bobby* said. “At the beginning I told myself
I liked it because I couldn’t do anything
better, but towards the end I realized it was
bad for me and that it wasn’t worth it for the
short high you would get.”
Synthetics are appealing to students that
are on probation because it is less likely for
them to get caught if they are drug tested.
“There are certain test kits available, but
the synthetic drugs don’t show up on the
standard test kits,” Davis said.
While most of the standard test kits do
not show up the chemicals of synthetics, the
kits that are being used are progressively
becoming more prone of the chemicals used
in synthetic drugs the more that it becomes
a problem.
“I heard about them from my friend,”
Bobby said. “I had smoked synthetics
before, but there were new drug tests that
could test for certain drugs [chemicals] in
them, but this one wouldn’t show up in the
tests so I got a hold of my friend who knew