ECSTASY USERS SNAP UP TESTER KITS

DRUG users are buying a testing kit which can distinguish between "pure"
ecstasy and its occasional street substitutes, the potentially fatal PMA
and the tranquilliser ketamine.

The West Australian understands the use of the $25 kits is on the rise.

However, it is mostly older users who are testing their pills. Younger
users - many still teenagers - either do not know or do not care that the
tests exist.

Ecstasy testing kits have been on sale in Perth for about 18 months. Before
that they were available on mail order from overseas.

The standard test is applied to a small scraping from a pill and reacts
with particular colour changes. The colours distinguish ecstasy-like
substances from speed, heroin or non-active chemicals.

The new test uses a different reagent and the makers claim that its series
of colour changes can distinguish MDMA from its close relative MDA,
methamphetamine (speed), PMA and ketamine.

Brett Wilkins, managing director of Melbourne-based Chemical Generation Pty
Ltd, said his test could be used as a backup to the original test, which is
sold by his company and a competitor, Sydney-based EZ-Test. Smart chemists
who make ecstasy pills would be able to fool one test but not both, he said.

On-site ecstasy testing group Enlighten recently tested 57 so-called
"ecstasy" pills. Thirty-three pills were ecstasy, seven were ketamine, one
was nothing and the rest were amphetamines.