Horrific flesh-rotting drug krokodil may be in Chicago, doctor says

[Indi Guy]

Source: Las Angeles Times

More possible cases of the use of krokodil, the flesh-eating drug popular in Russia and Eastern Europe as a cheaper alternative to heroin, have surfaced in the U.S., this time in a Chicago suburb, health officials said. 

Dr. Abhin Singla, an internist at Provena St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Joliet, Ill., reported that at least three patients had symptoms consistent with krokodil abuse, which can include scaly skin, abscesses, lesions and gangrenous limbs, according to a hospital statement this week. 

Krokodil is essentially a back-alley version of desomorphine, derived from codeine processed with ordinary ingredients including paint thinner, iodine, hydrochloric acid, red phosphorus, gasoline and lighter fluid. The drug ravages the flesh, and often amputation is the only viable medical treatment.

“It is a horrific way to get sick," said Dr. Singla. "The smell of rotten flesh permeates the room."...


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-krokodil-drug-flesh-eating-chicago-20131011,0,330855.story

[bunnies]

1. And its not even illegal.

Good thing weed is though.

[derby378]

12. Oh, it's illegal, all right...

Desomorphine is a Schedule I drug under the Controlled Substances Act. Krokodil is simply a fucked-up version of desomorphine - it's not exactly a "designer drug" like K2 Summit or the ubiquitous "bath salts."

Federal agents are free to apprehend anyone caught dealing krokodil, and I hope they do so with extreme prejudice.

[bunnies]

14. Check this out...

Carreno of the DEA says that krokodil isn't a controlled substance yet because the agency has to have more evidence that it's a public health problem. "You don't want a federal agency going around making things illegal willy-nilly…We'd have to see more than two cases before we control it," she notes. "But people are mixing codeine and gasoline, and shooting it into their veins. What do they expect?"

http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2013/09/zombie-apocalypse-drug-reaches-us-not-joke

[derby378]

17. I think a piece of my brain just imploded

Did Agent Carreno fail science class or something? I think I need to lie down now. Thanks for the link, though!

[bunnies]

18. Thats exactly what happened to me when I first read it.

Booze helps.

[derby378]

20. Thanks for the advice

[enlightenment]

26. Perhaps some of the hospitals

could send some evidence - amputated, gangrenous limbs for instance.

[Warpy]

2. Still no reports of it here in NM, where it would spread like wildfire

among people addicted to the more expensive black tar heroin coming up from Mexico. The average time from first usage to death is one year.

It's just another shining reason why the drug war is such a failure. Opiates are not particularly damaging to body systems even when taken at high doses for a long time. Bathtub drugs kill.

[FrodosPet]

29. Opiate overdose is a myth?

So all those O.D. stories are just a sack of bullshit? My friend was mistaken when she tried to suicide by overdose - it would not have killed her no matter how much she would have taken?

[Warpy]

38. Opiate overdose happens because the black market

has absolutely no quality control. People don't know what they're getting one batch to the next. That's why overdoses happen.

[leftyladyfrommo]

41. Wow. That's awful. n/t

[Voice for Peace]

3. I don't understand why anybody would take a flesh rotting drug?

DON'T DO THIS: search google images for krokodil

[Posteritatis]

4. Desperation when saner options aren't cutting it anymore (or aren't available). (nt)

[Ruby the Liberal]

6. Addiction sucks.

[Jamastiene]

21. Because the nature-given real drugs are all illegal.

There are people trying to make synthetic versions of the natural drugs that have all been made illegal. They are throwing everything but the kitchen sink (but not the stuff IN the kitchen sink, like Drano, lye, etc. ARE in there) into the mix when they make it.

This stupid war on drugs was started on the natural drugs that were made from the actual plants. Now, all this synthetic crap is coming out. Geez, I'd rather the actual nature-given version of these highs be legal than to see people go through this crap. Meth, bath salts, this krokodil thing, are all horrible and should be the things that are illegal.

[Bonduel]

24. I do not believe for one moment that if weed were legal everywhere

that it would stop or even lessen this type of drug

[Jamastiene]

28. Of course not.

Weed would not have any effect on the use of this type of drug because they are completely different types of drugs. Weed and heroin are two different drugs with different types of highs. The people who want heroin, are not going to go out looking for weed. That would be like deciding you want lobster for dinner, then ordering tacos at the drive through at Taco Bell. You won't get lobster if you are ordering the wrong thing altogether.

If somebody wants weed, they'll smoke weed. People would use this krokodil drug in place of heroin. If heroin wasn't so heavily fought in the war on drugs and regulated instead, the people who would be using heroin would not have to turn to these synthetic drugs.

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/Misc/60minliv.htm
This is a link to a transcript of a 60 Minutes piece I saw years ago. It explains about the natural drugs in their pure form and how someone can be healthy while dealing with their addictions if given the natural drug they are addicted to.

The point is these synthetic drugs would not even need to be invented if the war on drugs was not causing the prices of street drugs and the consequences of trying to find them so devastating. We have prisons full of drug addicts while child molesters and murderers walk free. Something is wrong with that picture.

The war on drugs drives the prices of the nature-made, non-synthetic drugs up so high because it costs money to try to avoid the damn police, and military in some cases, while growing, harvesting, preparing, and shipping the plants it takes to make them. This synthetic crap can be made just about anywhere, i.e. in a bathtub. The people making these synthetic drugs are obviously not chemists. They put chemicals in these synthetic drugs that are way worse on the body than the natural drug ever was. I'm pretty sure there is no red phosphorus or lye or embalming fluid growing on or in a poppy plant.

[darkangel218]

5. Yah, we learned about it in school.

Its a horiffic way to die.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. Back in the 70's, I used to think powder cocaine was bad

When a friend of a room mate offered me some, I distinctly remember saying
"No thanks..I am afraid I might like it and I can't afford anything more than pot".
( Pot was SO cheap then.....)
I did/do not like alcohol, and avoided the more common speed, so my vices were cheap and infrequent.

Then crack came out...we were all horrified by the tales of its use and damage and strong addiction.

Later, it was meth. I have seen people on meth, unfortunately they were living way too close to my house.

The tv show, VICE, did a segment on krocodil in Russia..it may be on YouTube...
sort of instant leprosy, quite horrifying.

[leftyladyfrommo]

42. I was from the 60's

No one could afford cocaine. It was the drug of the rich not us poor hippies.

Heroine was the heavy then. Addiction to it is awful but it is nothing compared with all of this new stuff.

[boomer55]

8. sucks to be them but actions have consequences.... dont do drugs.

[brett_jv]

10. It's really an unreasonably bad consequence ...

Created directly by the 'War on (some) Drugs'.

IOW poor addicts substituting a horrifyingly evil bathtub version of their drug of choice because they can't afford the hugely inflated cost (or lack of availability) of said DoC (both being directly due to the WoD).

I say, let them have their DoC at a price that reasonably reflects it's cost of production and cost/supply relationship, and they would have it at far lower cost than this 'krokodil' crap, not to mention put the drug gangs out of business, and put the tax money (and saving in jail costs) into the coffers of the state, and make addiction help available at a low cost.

The consequences of the drug war are far worse than the consequences from the drugs themselves. As mentioned above, pharmaceutical opioids are borderline harmless to the body's systems (apart from the addiction, of course), even when shot ... as long as that's done in a sanitary way (clean needles, etc ... hard to come by in many areas of the US). Instead we have people getting their damn flesh eaten away and dying. FOR WHAT?!?

The WoD is stupid, evil, inhumane, and insanely expensive in so very many ways. Not to mention, it violates people's freedom pretty profoundly.

[Jamastiene]

23. Agreed.

The natural drugs these horrid synthetic drugs are trying to imitate are not nearly as bad as these synthetic drugs. I hate to see people go through this because the drugs they really wish they could have are so hard to get due the stupid War on Drugs.

The War on Drugs is ridiculous. It is like the government picks out something that is popular and decides to make it illegal, then goes after every instance of it they can find to destroy it and any people nearby while they are at it.

[wordpix]

31. +100 and I'm an oldster. War on drugs has got to end and hopefully end this taking of poisons

You can totally wreck your life on alcohol and cigarettes and they're legal.

Legalize the natural highs (hey it rhymes, good slogan)

[lunasun]

33. yes even that synth pot K2 can poison you

http://www.livescience.com/6149-fake-weed-real-drug-k2-causing-hallucinations-teens.html

[madrchsod]

35. yup that shit is deadly...

even if it doesn`t kill ya it fries your brain.

[lunasun]

37. it is a legal substitute for illegal marijuana

sick and crazy WOD

[leftyladyfrommo]

43. Oh, yea.

I've known tons of people who completely crashed on alcohol. I have known exactly one for sure that has been an heroin addict.

[eppur_se_muova]

9. How ironic that something named after a predatory reptile should be dangerous ...

I mean, who knew ?

[DisgustipatedinCA]

44. This was a slang name given to the drug based on one of its side effects

I read this a couple of weeks ago, but I don't remember where. It's the Russian word for crocodile, and its Russian users gave it that nickname because of the dry, scaly skin that users develop.

[dipsydoodle]

11. I think I'll stick with

chocolate.

[Posteritatis]

13. Heck, snorting live badgers would probably be a safer long-term bet than that stuff. (nt)

[bunnies]

19. ...

You sure about that?

[Sunlei]

15. think this is coming from russia? or made here from domestic codeine tablets?

I read pharmacy products containing codeine in Russia are over the counter, where here codeine is an rx drug.

This stuff is really nasty, it's worse than meth.!

[backscatter712]

27. I'd bet it's made domestically.

If you were going to go to the trouble of smuggling drugs around the world, you might as well smuggle the good shit, rather than Krokodil.

My guess is that someone figured out how to cook it up using "purple drank" codeine cough syrup.

[Zorra]

16. "paint thinner, iodine, hydrochloric acid, red phosphorus, gasoline and lighter fluid."

King Heroin can make his slaves do absolutely anything for a fix. From robbery to murder to prostitution to taking flesh eating drugs processed with paint thinner, iodine, hydrochloric acid, red phosphorus, gasoline and lighter fluid.

[backscatter712]

22. It's basically like cooking meth, except using codeine instead of pseudoephedrine.

What boggles my mind is that Krokodil makes Faces of Meth look like a beauty pageant...

[wordpix]

32. hard to believe anyone would put those toxic chemicals in one's body

Horrifying

[backscatter712]

25. Are you stressed out, have too many worries? Ask your doctor about Krokodil!

Krokodil has some minor side-effects such as nausea, indigestion, circulatory problems, addiction, becoming a thieving scumbag, skin irritation, skin-death, gangrene, necrosis, limbs looking like half-eaten turkey legs, death, undeath, craving for the flesh of the living, and constipation.

Ask your doctor if Krokodil is right for you!

[Indi Guy]

30. You forgot to put the windblown seascape...

...and the warm ambient music in the background.

[backscatter712]

34. And I need the cartoon of the drug's molecular effects...

Let's see: should I do the opiate molecules hijacking neurons at gunpoint?

Or the cartoon of the drain cleaner and battery-acid molecules sizzling away at your blood vessels?

[alp227]

39. Not in Florida?

[Recursion]

40. Desomorphine is 80 years old and has been in continuous use in the US since then

Last edited Sat Oct 12, 2013, 12:02 PM - Edit history (1)

Seriously, build a big enough wagon and reporters will jump on it.

[msanthrope]

45. Just last week, I was reading up on how our failed WOD accounts for the epidemic of Krokodil in

Russia...

http://metamorphosis.democraticunderground.com/10023788993

Teh stupid, it burns....

[roamer65]

46. This is why we need to liberalize our drug laws.

MJ should be legal and as available as alcohol. The harder drugs we need to look to the Netherlands and their controlled government run system.

[Hekate]

47. What could possibly go wrong injecting paint thinner, hydrochloric acid, red phosphorus, gasoline...

... and such? Who even thinks up this shit in the first place? The video at link says average life span of users in Russia is 2 years, but I can't imagine anyone living anywhere near that long.

Yes, I understand addicts will behave like addicts -- my question is about what kind of person throws these ingredients together in the first place to sell to someone else to get a high. What a nightmare.