Via the Los Angeles Times, this news:
An industrial chemical used in plastic products has been cropping up in illegal drugs from California to Maine, a sudden and puzzling shift in the drug supply that has alarmed health researchers.
Its name is bis(2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-4-piperidyl) sebacate, commonly abbreviated as BTMPS. The chemical is used in plastic for protection against ultraviolet rays, as well as for other commercial uses.
In an analysis released Monday, researchers from UCLA, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and other academic institutions and harm reduction groups collected and tested more than 170 samples of drugs that had been sold as fentanyl in Los Angeles and Philadelphia this summer. They found roughly a quarter of the drugs contained BTMPS.
Researchers called it the most sudden change in the U.S. illegal drug supply in recent history, based on chemical prevalence. They found that BTMPS sometimes dramatically exceeded the amount of fentanyl in drug samples and, in some cases, had made up more than a third of the drug sample.
It was also a growing presence in fentanyl over the summer: In June, none of the L.A. fentanyl samples tested by the team contained BTMPS, the analysis found. By August, it was detected in 41% of them.
Here's the Medrxiv preprint. I don't think the material is particularly bad for you, but I suspect it's not particularly good for you either (especially if you smoke it.)
I know this is remarking on criminals being criminals, but it is distressing to me how impure drugs of abuse are, and how the whole supply chain seems to rely on "any old white powder" and so now they're using a random UV stabilizer to extend their product. Sad!
Why use something like this to extend product? Aren't there lots of cheaper things available on scale that they could use (and would likely be less harmful and characteristic?) -- Hap
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