The analysis of the wastewater of twenty-five countries reveals an increase in the presence of cannabis, cocaine, amphetamines and metamphetics. Only Ecstasy (and its active ingredient, MDMA) has decreased.
Le Monde with AFP
The supply and consumption of drugs, slightly hampered in 2020 by the health crisis, returned in 2021 to their high level – before Pandemic, according to the European Drug Observatory and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) in Son
Cannabis remains, by far, the most consumed substance, “more than 22 million European adults having declared” having taken it in 2021, according to the report. Cocaine follow, with 3.5 million declared consumers; MDMA-ECSTASY, with 2.6 million, and amphetamines and its 2 million consumers.
reporting of 52 new drugs
The drug offer, “remains high in the whole of the EU” and even exceeds “the levels before the pandemic” for cocaine: a “record volume of 213 tonnes” has been seized In the EU in 2020, the year of the latest data available even though it was marked by travel restrictions and festive locations linked to COVID. Two hundred two tonnes had been seized in 2019. “This indicator and others suggest that at present, nothing indicates that the upward trend in the availability of this drug, observed in recent years, has changed “, estimates the observatory.
In general, “classic drugs have never been so accessible and new, strongly dosed substances continue to appear”, is alarmed the report. “Almost everything that has psychoactive potential is likely to appear on the market,” says the observatory. In 2021, fifty-two new drugs were “reported for the first time”, including “15 new synthetic cannabinoids”.
These molecules produced in the laboratory, sometimes very strongly dosed and toxic, imitate the hovering effect of THC (the psychotropic substance of cannabis) and are often sprayed on grass, sometimes without the knowledge of consumers. The 2020 report was already alarmed by the growth of these products.
This year is also concerned about the increase in “summary cathinons” (6 new detected), come out of a mixture between cocaine, MDMA-Ecstasy and amphetamines. The two most widespread are the “3-MMC” and the “3-CMC”, which can be sold legally and are diverted for recreational purposes.
The Netherlands found that the number of poisonings suspected of involving 3-MMC had gone from 10 in 2018 to 64 in 2020, notes the report. The European Commission proposed their control in mid-March.