EXPERTS WARN OF DESIGNER DRUG RISKS

The three designer drugs circulating in greater Charleston -- Ecstasy,
ketamine and GHB -- all have or had a valid medical use, which helps
devotees sell the addictive, potentially deadly party drugs to novices,
according to experts.

"As soon as anyone hears there is a legitimate reason for any treatment,
they say it must be safe," said Dr. W. Alexander Morton, a pharmacist at
the Medical University of South Carolina specializing in psychiatric drugs.

"Thousands, maybe millions of people have taken Ecstasy and enjoyed it and
did not have problems," he said, but Ecstasy can kill people.

Taking a designer drug is like spinning a roulette wheel. A person may
suffer a heart attack, irregular heart beat, seizures, kidney failure or
liver problems.

People may become dehydrated with Ecstasy and stop breathing with GHB or
ketamine, which Morton considers the most dangerous of the three.

Ketamine, also known as Special K, has served as surgical anesthesia in
people and animals, but it causes hallucinations and makes people
dissociate or "come unglued," he said.

GHB, the date-rape drug Gamma-hydroxybutyrate, was sold in health food
stores a decade ago; body builders thought it helped them develop muscles.
When users became abusers, the feds took it off the shelves.

In a pharmaceutical form, it's used to treat narcolepsy, a neurological
disease in which people suddenly and uncontrollably fall asleep.

Touted as a safe drug by users, Ecstasy, or MDMA
(methylenedioxymethamfetamine), offers a four-to six-hour high and is
particularly popular among middle-class adolescents and young adults, said
Charleston County sheriff's Sgt. David Robertson, a narcotics investigator.

Known as a love drug, it increases euphoria and empathy, he said, and users
appear to derive pleasure from touching.

Ecstasy sometimes is prescribed to treat extreme cases of post traumatic
stress disorder and has been used in marital counseling because it makes
people feel good and forgive one another, Morton said.

In 2000, approximately 2 million Ecstasy tablets were smuggled into this
country every week, according to U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration
estimates. Locally, the drug appears most popular among the young crowd
that frequents all-night rave parties held at clubs or in rented
warehouses. Doses sell for $20 to $30.

The drug carries health risks such as dehydration, seizures, kidney and
heart failure, Robertson said.

"People don't realize that they are getting involved in something they are
not able to control," said Susan Weinstein, a counselor and the chief
operating officer at Palmetto Lowcountry Behavioral Health.

In the past two years, patients increasingly have come to the center after
using one or more of the designer drugs, sometimes in addition to alcohol
or cocaine, she said. College-age students are the largest group of users,
but she also is seeing high school students.

"My guess is there is a lot more of this than we suspect is going on," she
said.

"My concern is designer drugs are coming out so quickly that we only will
know (long-term effects) down the road. You start with one and you have
another one almost immediately or you put two together ... Do we have a
handle on it? Absolutely not."

As for users, Weinstein said, "we do not know if they will ever be the same
again."

Internet sites post recipes for designer drugs. "You can walk out of Lowe's
with everything you need to make GHB," Morton said.

So buyers never know what they are getting, Weinstein said.

Each designer drug is similar to a prescription drug but has a chemical
chain altered to provide somewhat different effects and to get around laws.

"Unfortunately, there is a big market out there," Morton said.

"It's all advertising," he added, noting that dealers market designer drugs.

"There always will be drugs available. We need to worry about drugs that
are not here yet. Someone is going to say, 'Try some of this.' "

Glenn Smith of The Post and Courier Staff contributed to this report.