THE GHB TRAGEDY

Despite reports linking it to dozens of deaths and thousands of overdoses,
the illegal supplement GHB just won't disappear.

First banned in the United States more than a decade ago by federal
regulators, the substance -- best known as a party drug used on the rave
scene -- remains popular with fitness buffs, insomniacs and the depressed,
who buy it on the Internet and from underground sources.

Now medical experts report another problem: GHB is highly addictive and can
be more difficult to kick than heroin. But unlike opiate addiction, most
doctors are unaware of the stranglehold that GHB has on users.
Consequently, medical treatment is often ineffective.

GHB, which severely depresses the nervous system, has sent more people to
emergency rooms than a more highly publicized club drug, Ecstasy -- about
12,900 at last count -- and has been blamed for 71 GHB-related deaths since
1990, according to federal statistics.

"This is the most addictive drug I've ever seen," said Dr. Stephen W.
Smith, an emergency room doctor at Hennepin County Medical Center in
Minneapolis who has treated about 50 patients for GHB addiction problems
since 1998. "People are desperate to get off of it because it's destroying
their lives," he said, yet only about one in 10 of his patients has
successfully kicked the habit.

No one knows exactly how many Americans are addicted to GHB, or gamma
hydroxy butyrate, because the federal government did not begin monitoring
GHB abuse until after the drug was declared illegal in March 2000. No
statistics have yet been released. GHB use is also difficult to track
because the chemical is excreted from the body within 12 hours, and most
emergency rooms don't test for the presence of the drug. Consequently, GHB
use often goes undetected.

Trinka Porrata, a retired Los Angeles Police Department narcotics detective
who has investigated GHB for more than five years, believes that the
statistics on emergency room visits and deaths linked to GHB understate the
problem. "These figures are just the tip of the iceberg and the actual
numbers are probably much higher," said Porrata, who advises law
enforcement officials on GHB's dangers.

Most GHB abusers are not street junkies looking for a new high, however.
Typically, they are people who have turned to the drug, which is promoted
as a natural, nutritional supplement, to build buff bodies, lose weight or
to fight insomnia, premenstrual pain and depression. Some professional
athletes have used the substance -- usually sold as a salty-tasting liquid
-- to improve performance. Phoenix Suns basketball player Tom Gugliotta,
for instance, nearly died in 1999 after ingesting a GHB supplement to help
him sleep.

Some users know the drug is illegal and buy bootleg brews over the Internet
or from the back rooms of health food emporiums. Others stumble across ads
on the Internet and purchase what they believe is a natural remedy to beat
the blues or get in shape. While there's no evidence that it helps increase
muscle mass, "GHB seems to help users sleep better," said Smith, an
assistant professor of clinical emergency medicine at the University of
Minnesota School of Medicine. "If they suffer from depression, they tell me
that GHB makes them feel normal for the first time in their lives."

Medical experts don't have a clear idea of how GHB affects the body because
no definitive research has been done. Based on physicians' observations of
how it affects people, however, they speculate that it alters levels of
brain chemicals like dopamine and serotonin, which regulate mood and
impulse control. In small doses, GHB is a mild stimulant that produces a
feeling of intoxication or euphoria and releases inhibitions, which is why
it's a popular party drug.

In higher doses, however, anecdotal reports indicate it seriously depresses
the central nervous system. Even a small increase in the dosage can push
the sedative effects to a lethal level, causing unconsciousness, slowed
heart rate, respiratory depression and coma, doctors say.

And habitual use, even for just a few weeks, can cause people to become
physically and psychologically addicted, according to doctors who've
treated GHB addicts.

"These are often not people with an addiction history," said Dr. Karen
Miotto, a psychiatrist at the University of California, Los Angeles, School
of Medicine. "They stumble on GHB and have the hardest time staying off.
I've had people cry, 'I've never abused drugs. I'm a monster. What happened
to me?' "

Tony Young, 39, of Seattle, saw an ad in a bodybuilding magazine for a
product touted as an all-natural supplement that would help boost muscle
mass. He ordered a two-month supply for $75. The supplement, whose active
ingredient is a form of GHB, made him feel more relaxed and improved his
sleep. But if he missed a dose, "I'd get cranky and severely depressed."

He knew he was hooked. His addiction escalated to a $4,000-a-month habit.
He sipped capfuls of GHB virtually around the clock. He tried drug
rehabilitation twice but relapsed both times because he felt swallowed up
in a depression when he stopped taking GHB.

Young struggled to maintain his normal routine, but he'd sometimes black
out while driving. He was arrested several times for driving under the
influence, and he crashed two cars, including one belonging to his
employer, which cost him his job as an elevator mechanic supervisor.

About a year ago, Young, a husband and a father of two young boys, was sent
to jail after a DUI conviction. "GHB ruined my life," he said in a
telephone interview from the King County Jail in Kent, Wash. "I've let
everyone down."

Despite the federal ban, GHB and its various chemical cousins, including
GBL (gamma butyrolactone) and BD (1,4 butenediol), remain popular at gyms
frequented by serious bodybuilders. It is passed around weight rooms, sold
out of cars in parking lots and dispensed from behind juice-bar counters,
according to those familiar with its sale and use. For bodybuilders, GHB's
allure comes from the scientifically unproven claim that its use will help
people build bigger, leaner physiques. Promoters of the drug contend that
it helps to release growth hormones, boosting muscle mass and trimming fat.

GHB was first developed in the 1960s as an anesthetic, but research was
discontinued when high doses in animals caused grand mal seizures, said Dr.
Wallace D. Winters, a former UCLA pharmacology professor who has studied
GHB. In the 1980s, GHB was sold in health food stores as a sleep aid and
nonsteroidal performance enhancer for bodybuilders. In 1990, however, the
Food and Drug Administration yanked GHB from the market after the agency
received dozens of reports of adverse affects, ranging from nausea and
vomiting to seizures, comas and death.

Supplement manufacturers circumvented the federal ban by developing
chemically similar products. When people consumed these products, which had
legal uses as industrial solvents or cleaners, the body metabolized them
and converted them into GHB. Thus, the products had the same effects as
those of GHB. These products were marketed under such brand names as Blue
Nitro, Enliven, Thunder Nectar and Serenity. In March 2000, federal
regulators stepped in again to close a legal loophole and extended the ban
to include chemical analogues of GHB.

But that action still hasn't halted trade in GHB products. The Internet is
rife with thinly disguised products containing GHB and similar compounds
that sell for $50 to $75 a bottle. And while the manufacture and sale of
GHB and similar compounds is against the law, the drug easily can be made
with two legal ingredients: gamma butyl lactone, an industrial solvent used
for degreasing engines and as a floor stripper, and sodium hydroxide, or lye.

Recipes for making bootleg GHB are available over the Internet, and the
street version is potentially hazardous because of uncertain quality
control in underground labs, according to the National Institute on Drug
Abuse. In fact, there have been several cases in which users burned their
mouths, throats and esophagi with what is essentially lye because the GHB
wasn't formulated correctly, according to Porrata.

GHB seems to "constantly keep reinventing itself" and attract new groups of
users, said Dr. Alex Stalcup, an addiction specialist in Concord, Calif.,
who first noticed in the late 1980s that habitual GHB users suffered
withdrawal symptoms. He was medical director of San Francisco's
Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic at the time. He said he is now treating GHB
addicts who have worked in Silicon Valley's technology companies and who
have used the drug "to come off of amphetamines."

To be sure, GHB isn't addictive for everyone. "The people who get addicted
are not the partyers who take it occasionally," said Smith, of the
University of Minnesota. "The GHB addicts are the ones who use it regularly
for health reasons -- bodybuilders or people who suffer from depression."