Bath salts (drug)

[7][11] They are generally less able to cross the blood brain barrier than amphetamines due to the presence of a beta-keto group that increases the compound's polarity.

[citation needed] Bath salts come in a powdered or crystallised form which can be swallowed, smoked, injected or snorted.

Bath salt/monkey dust users have reported symptoms that include headache, heart palpitations, nausea, cold fingers, hallucinations, paranoia, and panic attacks.

Users who have overdosed often display symptoms of agitation, delirium, hallucinations, seizures, tachycardia, hypertension or hyperthermia.

[7] Based on reports to the American Association of Poison Control Centers, use of bath salts in the US is thought to have increased significantly between 2010 and 2012.

[7] The increase in use is thought to result from their widespread availability, undetectability on many drug tests, and sensationalist media coverage.

[29] To avoid being controlled by the Medicines Act, designer drugs such as mephedrone have been described as "bath salts", or other misnomers such as "plant food" despite the compounds having no history of being used for these purposes.

[38][39] In 2018, in the city Stoke-on-Trent,[40] Monkey dust was reported to be an entirely new compound, when in fact preparations of MDPV and MDPHP or "bath salts" have been available since the early 2000s.

[41] The print press and broadcast media have often used textual framing techniques to report on synthetic cathinone use among society's most vulnerable.

[citation needed] Terms like "epidemic", "zombie attack" and more recently "incredible hulk" are often used when describing users.

[7] They remained obscure until the first decade of the 21st century when underground chemists rediscovered them and began to use them in designer drugs, as the compounds were legal in many jurisdictions.

[6] In Europe, the drugs were predominantly purchased from websites, but in the US they were mainly sold in small independent stores such as gas stations and head shops.

[48] Hundreds of other designer drugs or "legal highs" have been reported, including artificial chemicals such as synthetic cannabis and semi-synthetic substances such as methylhexaneamine.