2024-04-14 19:54:13
Gabrielė Navickaitė, investigative journalist of the portal “15min”, spent some time studying how “Flakka” spreads in Lithuania. This drug is mainly sold in Vilnius, Kaunas and Klaipėda, and is mostly used by young people under 30 years of age.
“In Lithuania, among the youth, very popular substances are spreading – “crystals”, the so-called “kristė”. The representatives of the underground informed me that instead of these substances, other quacks are sold – blue in color, which looks very similar, but this is a new substance that has arrived in Lithuania, called “Flakka”.
This is a rare substance in the Baltic countries, but it is well known both in the USA and in Western Europe due to its dangerousness, high risk of addiction, and the damage it causes,” said G. Navickaitė in the “Actual Interview” program of “Žiniai Radio”.
This substance causes a person to have hallucinations, psychosis, his movements become uncoordinated, heart and kidney diseases appear, and there is also a huge risk of addiction.
Flakka is purchased through the messaging app Telegram, paying with crypto-currencies, all you need to do is join certain groups.
“In those groups, there are advertising portals for drug dealers, where you can basically get any substance you want. After choosing those materials, you transfer money to the seller in cryptocurrency, and he sends you the location where the material is hidden.
Nowadays, the merchant and the consumer no longer meet, they do not know each other’s identity. It is very easy to buy drugs,” the journalist stated.
Police representative Mindaugas Akelaitis admits that the amount of various synthetic substances is growing all over the world, and Lithuania is no exception.
“The facts show that new psychotropic substances are entering Lithuania. They are identified and removed during police investigations. This is shown not only by Lithuanian experience, but also by international investigations,” said the police representative.
He assured that the police monitor social networks and see that the sale of drugs on the Internet is a growing trend, and the officers conduct several investigations against both persons who sell and those who possess narcotic substances.
M. Akelaitis pointed out that the specialized units of the Lithuanian criminal police, which are primarily focused on criminal intelligence, the segment of the largest drug dealers, last year about 40 percent. directed all its capabilities specifically to the fight against drug distribution.
“If someone is raising children, parents and relatives should be vigilant and see if their child shows any signs (of drug use): they don’t spend money, parents don’t really understand where that money goes, if the child behaves adequately, if his condition is normal.
If we see such signals, we should think that this may be an indicator that the child has already encountered a problem and steps should be taken to get him out of this trouble,” he warned.
Dr. toxicologist G. Laubner-Sakalauskienė said that Alfa-PVP, called “Flakka” on the street, is a synthetic cathinone that started to spread in the USA in the last century, so it is not such a new drug on a global scale.
“When it comes to all new psychoactive substances, this particular group – synthetic cathinones – is already the second largest after synthetic cannabinoids. There are already 204 materials for today. It means that we are talking about Flakka, or Alfa-PVP, as one substance, but there are 204 of them”, explained G. Laubner-Sakalauskienė.
According to the doctor, synthetic cathinones are substances that are synthesized by simulating the effects of methamphetamine or MDMA (“wheels”). These are highly stimulating substances that produce large spikes in dopamine – very high pleasure, the associated joy, but also psychoses and hallucinations.
“Although we only treat adults at my hospital, we’ve certainly had a lot of these patients in recent weeks. What does a lot mean? Enough to pay attention. Most often, those patients come already with psychoses and huge hallucinations, huge psychomotor excitement.
It takes eight and sometimes ten people to subdue one person. Those people cut themselves, try to cut themselves or cut their tongue. They harm not only those around them, but also themselves,” she said about the terrible consequences of the drug.
2024-04-14 19:54:13