WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
NITROUS OXIDE
In October, in Vigneulles-lès-Hattonchâtel, a 15-year-old teenager was found dead near the soccer stadium. Two young people in just a few months. " The first had been using nitrous oxide in a festive context, while the second was addicted and isolated ," explains Bruno Frémont, the Verdun forensic pathologist who autopsied the two bodies.
How many victims are there? Have they been counted? As we talk, parents tell me that they too have discovered aerosols and balloons in their children's bedrooms," says the worried doctor. I think this practice is totally underestimated by the health authorities.
When contacted about this phenomenon, the Direction Générale de la Santé did not respond.
Yohan died of cardiac arrest. His parents discovered that he had been inhaling these dusting cans for three months. Several times the week of his death, and twice the same evening. This time, he fell flat on his face," says Nadine. The firemen tried to revive him for an hour and a half. Since then, the questions have gone round and round. Why and how? Their 19-year-old son, a BTS student, was a discreet boy, with no excesses. The autopsy confirmed it. There were no drugs in his blood, not even a glass of alcohol. Daniel, the father, knew all his friends who were present at the time of the tragedy: "They're a good bunch of friends," says the man who was even their soccer coach when they were kids.
So, a month ago, they decided to alert the other parents. "You know, we're a bit dead with Yohan, so if we can prevent another tragedy from happening..." they confide. And they've set up a Facebook group, Association Yohan. "One father told us he lost his son three years ago in Canada.
The success of nitrous oxide, which came over from England, is such that it has become the third most widely consumed psychoactive product among French students, after cannabis and poppers, according to a recent study by the mutual insurance company Smerep.
When contacted about this phenomenon, the Direction Générale de la Santé did not respond.
Internet sales: Europe in a global market
The European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Addiction (EMCDDA) and Europol estimate that EU suppliers accounted for almost half of all drug sales on the darknet between 2011 and 2015. It should also be pointed out that while attention is often focused on the "darknet", social media and the surface web play a significant role in the sale of new psychoactive substances and drugs diverted from their original use.
In this context, EMCDDA draws attention to new substances associated with benzodiazepines. 14 new benzodiazepines have in fact been listed by the European Union's early warning system since 2015. The availability of these substances on the illicit drug market appears to be increasing in some countries. Yet these substances play a well-known role in opiate overdose deaths (as they increase the risk of respiratory depression), albeit one that is often overlooked. The EMCDDA is also concerned about a possible increase in use among young people, and recommends the implementation of more in-depth surveys, greater political consideration and more prevention efforts.
As Professor Jean Pierre Goullé points out, the imagination of poisoning chemists knows no bounds.
Sourced from wholesale markets in China and India, then imported into Europe for further processing, these products are often marketed as legal euphoriants. It's true that many of them evade the international laws in force. They are then resold in place of "banned drugs" thanks to sophisticated and aggressive marketing strategies, which do not hesitate to infiltrate social networks and target young people. Some of these new psychoactive drugs are offered on the Net as simple medicines, or even under the most fanciful names of "bath salts", "incense", "medicinal plants", "fertilizers", "ecstasy", "amphetamines" or "cocaine".
For the EMCDDA, the new psychoactive substances are still a challenge for public health.
However, the harmful consequences of their use on public health remain high. With the arrival in Europe of synthetic opiates and synthetic cannabinoids, associated with death and acute intoxication, EMCDDA has carried out risk assessments on an unprecedented number of substances.
Fentanyl derivatives, in particular, present a real challenge for health services, law enforcement agencies and public health. These substances are effective in very small doses, and are easy to transport and conceal.
15 reasons not to decriminalize cannabis
At a time when the question of decriminalizing cannabis is regularly in the news, here are 15 reasons why we shouldn't give a false signal of harmlessness to our young people:
Today's cannabis is nothing like the cannabis of the 60s, which contained 0.6% to 6% THC (Tetra Hydro Cannabinol, the main active ingredient in cannabis). Today, it contains between 10 and 35% THC. It's like offering vodka instead of cider.
As the product is much stronger, physical and psychological dependence sets in very quickly.
Cannabis is being used younger and younger, right from the start of secondary school, by young people whose cerebral maturation is not yet complete.
Cannabis is a true psychotropic drug, which has a lasting effect on behavior and remains stored in the body for at least 28 days after one dose. It takes 4 days to eliminate half the cannabis taken. It can be "flashed back" or "released" in the event of severe stress or exertion.
Its main effects are an amotivation syndrome, disinhibition (risk-taking), concentration difficulties, memory problems, loss of spatio-temporal reference points, disorganized thinking and subsequent failure at school, and respiratory problems (coughing, chronic bronchitis), weakened immune defenses, violent behavior, abnormally reduced sperm count, virility, anxiety, increased risk of schizophrenia, fixed ideas and hallucinations, depression, suicide.
Cannabis raises the tolerance threshold for alcohol. Those who have smoked cannabis tolerate alcohol very well, and need strong alcohols to feel its effects. A young cannabis user can drink several glasses of alcohol without getting drunk. They won't realize they're overdoing it, and may even end up in an alcoholic coma.
Cannabis' effects are potentiated by alcohol: the effect of combining the two is to multiply the levels.
Cannabis is seven times more carcinogenic than tobacco.
Cannabis increases strokes in young people
Cannabis is recognized as the 3rd leading cause of myocardial infarction.
Decriminalizing cannabis would be tantamount to authorizing driving under its influence, even though it is responsible for many deaths on the road, even for drivers who have not smoked before taking the wheel, due to the long-lasting storage of cannabis in the body.
Decriminalizing cannabis would not reduce cannabis consumption, but would shift the market to more potent drugs (cocaine, heroin). Will these new drugs then have to be legalized?
Countries that have decriminalized, such as Sweden in the 70s, have reversed course in the face of the health and social disasters caused by decriminalization. Sweden has recriminalized and implemented a genuine prevention policy (40 hours of education from kindergarten to high school). Even the Netherlands recognizes that consumption among young people has increased with legalization, and has closed its coffee shops to the French.
In 1989, France signed the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, article 33 of which stipulates that "States Parties shall take all appropriate measures, including legislation, to prevent the use of children under the age of 18.
appropriate measures, including legislative, administrative, social and educational measures, to protect children from the illicit use of
psychotropic substances, as defined in the relevant international conventions, and to prevent the use of children in the illicit production and trafficking of such substances".
Decriminalization would be interpreted as a false signal of harmlessness towards our youth. Do we want to keep them healthy
or bring them down?
Cannabis degrades, debases and kills
With the debate on decriminalizing cannabis regularly dominating the media, Patrice Tran Ba Huy, Professor of Medicine at the Saint-Louis-Lariboisière Faculty, member of the French National Academy of Medicine and President of the French ENT Society, explains the fearsome health consequences that such a decision would undoubtedly amplify. Read the article.
Drugs: the urgent need to inform young people
As the proposal to decriminalize cannabis regularly comes to the fore, a mother sounds the alarm.
Let us not lose sight of our objective
We notice that many parents want more and more information on the products, the exact consequences of their consumption...They would like to see pictures, to understand how drugs affect the body, their exact impact on the brain – (as if the human being is nothing but a brain, as some would have us believe)... This intellectual approach would be totally legitimate were it not for its consequences: we get drowned in the details and pushed further away from our objective of prevention.
By the way, that is how misinformation campaigns on drugs are orchestrated: they focus people's attention on a detail or one dangerous aspect rather than having them focus on the whole picture. People are therefore distracted from being able to take proper action.
The approach that we suggest you follow is very simple: to be informed objectively and scientifically on the dangers of drugs, to sustain as much as possible a climate of confidence and dialogue, to discuss with our children what they are doing, whether they take drugs, whether they have been offered any, whether they have friends who take drugs and so on.
Let us get back to the basics by reminding them that:
• Drug consumption is not inevitable. Goodwill can defeat it. Our children have to know how to say NO when they are offered drugs;
• Drugs are not a disease: they are not contagious;
• The body cannot heal itself. The only way to stop them is to not consume them anymore – be careful not to be fooled by drugs used to "treat" drug addicts).
A drug is a drug. Let us keep in mind that there are no drugs less dangerous than others!
Warning: Danger!
If your child meets at least 8 of the following criteria for longer than 6 months, he will be considered hyperactive
(extract from The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), published by the American Psychiatric Association).
Fidgets with his hands or feet, or squirms in his seat
Has difficulty in remaining seated
Is easily distracted by outside stimuli
Has difficulty waiting for his turn while playing or in group situations
Answers questions before they are finished
Has difficulty in following instructions that are given to him
Has difficulty in keeping his attention on something
Switches between activities without finishing them
Has difficulty in playing quietly
Is overly talkative
Often interrupts others
Seems not to listen to what he is told
Often forgets his things
Is often involved in dangerous activities without being aware of their consequences
And if he is diagnosed as hyperactive he will be prescribed ritalin, the obedience pill, called “kiddy coke”, with disastrous effects. The chemical structure of methylphenidate, Ritalin, is that of phenylethylamine, which has pharmacological properties similar to those of amphetamins.
People will tell you that Ritalin will enable your child to focus better, etc. That might be true for the first weeks, as with any psychostimulant, but your child will be influenced by an amphetamine with all the associated disastrous secondary effects such as
Sleep disorders
Over stimulation
anorexia
psychoses (suicidal ideation, paranoia)
Tactile hallucinations, eg Itchiness of the extremities
Arterial hypertension, myocardial infarctus and pulmonary embolism
Pulmonary embolism. Amphetamines, even at therapeutic doses, are suspected of inducing of pulmonary arterial hypertension and respiratory depression
Acute renal failure
