What price ‘the cat’?
By DR M GRAHAM, MBChB, PhD, FRSM, MICR, MFSSoc MEPHEDRONE, OR METHCATH CATHINONE (formerly ‘Legal Highs’), is related to ephedrine. Its street name is Miaow Miaow, Kitty Kat or Cat Food and on the corner it sells for £10 a gram, which is £30 cheaper than ‘coke’ (cocaine). It has taken over the market, not only on price, but on purity as street coke, ‘speed’ or ‘phet’ (amphetamine) ranges from 2% (typical standard) to 30% purity (premiership football standard) whereas Miaow is 100% pure for its street price! The savvy dealers will try and cut it with creatine or soap suds, but with little success and it maintains its purity by its price! The Saturday lottery ticket costs only £1 with chances of winning of 17 million to one. The Euromillions lottery ticket costs £2 and the chances of winning are 47 million to one. Miaow, however, can be bought for just £10 per gram and the chances of winning are 100%! The ‘high’ lasts all night and can affect the personality of the user for up to a week before the next dose, wreaking havoc on young couples’ new fragile relationships! Where the odd ‘spliff’ (cannabis) or a few pints of ‘wife beater’ (cider) were the culprits only a decade or two ago, Miaow, since it was made illegal in 2009, has seen its status rise 100 fold – it is snorted like coke. Unbeknown to the party animal It can be detected in hair, after one sample of use, up to 10 months later. It leaves the potential addict ‘chilled’, mildly disinhibited and potentially subject to abuse and violence by a vociferous, aggressive partner – male or female! If both partners abuse ‘the cat’ it can result in babies being left alone in their cots with wet, soiled nappies for far too long. It can turn submissive females into powerful tyrants and big strong men into weeping babies, when children are the bargaining tool. Especially when the ‘Justice’ system and the Treasury have put all their faith and might behind the mother (who in their eyes can do no wrong). Its detection in the hair of either partner has afforded custody to the other – or to social services if recreational drugs are detected in both parents. Attempts to dye or cut the hair by females has no effect on its detection, providing dilemmas for family courts. Where females were previously gaining custody of the children, the courts have swung to the opposite spectrum and awarded custody against the mother. The ultimate victims are the children. Disruption in continuity of care, rowing parents, social services intervention and untold pressures on supportive grandparents can only serve to destabilise the fabric of society. Both David Cameron’s and Tony Blair’s governments shouted “back to basics” to attain power! Is this now controlled drug really any worse than alcohol in dismantling our youth’s commitment to the upbringing of our children? Only time will tell.
Advocates of domestic violence prevention are banging their heads against a brick wall. They don’t appear to understand that making a drug illegal promotes its status on the drug scene. Today’s kids, just like yesterday’s, like being naughty. In the interim, alcohol (with or without ‘the cat’) will continue to wreck lives and families and still remains uncontrolled, while governments who swore to support young families reap enormous rewards from its sale to them! q REFERENCES • O’Byrne PM et al. Screening of Stimulants Including Designer Drugs in Urine Using a Liquid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry System. J Anal Toxicol. 2013. • Elie MP et al. Keeping pace with NPS releases: fast GC-MS screening of legal high products. Drug Test Anal. 2013. • den Hollander B et al. Long-term cognitive and neurochemical effects of ‘bath salt’ designer drugs methylone and mephedrone. Pharmacol Biochem Behav. 2013. • Mabbott S et al. 2p or not 2p: tuppence-based SERS for the detection of illicit materials. Analyst. 2013. • Petróczi A et al. New non-randomised model to assess the prevalence of discriminating behaviour: a pilot study on mephedrone. 2011; 6: 20. Subst Abuse Treat Prev Policy.
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