By Umar Salam.
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA, has decried the improvised forms of drug abuse perpetrated by youths in the country, which continually frustrates the Agency’s fight against substance abuse.
According to the NDLEA’s Head of Drug Reduction in Adamawa State, Mr Shehu Dankolo, who spoke to reporters in Yola, some drug abusers have deviced new methods of improvising harmless consumer products in substitution of banned drugs to get intoxicated.
Mr Dankolo also revealed that some abusers had invented a way of processing urine which they consume to feel intoxicated.
“There are certain controlled drugs, particularly codeine cough syrup. You know, federal government clamped seriously on them. Some of the companies closed down. So, the cough syrup that was initially N250 per bottle, but it is now sold for about N4,000. The same thing with tramadol which was N50 but is now about N500.
“Because these abused but banned drugs are so scarce and costly or entirely out of reach, people improvise other things. I won’t include so much detail so that people don’t read this and begin to experiment.
“There is a way they process urine. They take it and become intoxicated. There is a way they put maggi in some energy drinks and it gives them intoxication. There is a certain sweet they put in half bottle of water which they cover up and leave for some days. They form such other things. There are what we call new psychoactive substances. That is why drug abuse is difficult to tackle”, he said.
Dankolo urged the media to join hands with the NDLEA in creating more awareness against substance abuse in the country.