Street drug analysis: an eleven year perspective on illicit drug alteration.

Street drug analysis became a valuahle treat­ rnent tool during the "Summer of Love" in 1967 when thousands of young people flocked to San Francisco's Haight-Ashhury district and began "turn­ ing on" to a variety of unknown substances includ­ ing "peace pills." Adolescents with acute toxic reactions were walk­ ing into the walls of the Haight-Ashbury Free Med­ ical Clinic, and the counselors' usual talk-down ap­ proach was not working. Dr. David Smith, founder and director of the clinic, had the material ana­ lyzed and found that "peace pills" were actually phencyclidine (PCP). "When we first started, I thought people knew what they \.Vere taking, but it turned out they didn't have the foggiest idea," Dr. Smith said recently in an interview with 7be PharmChem Newsletter. "We conducted one study and found chat 40 percent of the kids didn't have any idea what they were taking. Somebody just said here's a pill and they cook it." 1 Adolescent drug-seeking hchavior still includes a certain amount of blind pill taking, especially among younger children, but there has been some improvement, according to Dr. Smith. However, look-alike drugs and drugs of deception continue to be a problem, not only for teenagers but for experienced drug users as well. Confidential substance analysis grew out of drug treatment, education, and prevention efforts in the early days of the counterculture movement and became even more crucial with the proliferation of clandestine labs manufacturing toxic "garbage" drugs and deadly powerful synthetic narcotics. One of the first programs established to inform, warn, and protect the public against the circulation of hazardous or lethal street drugs and adulterants was Analysis Anonymous. Analysis Anonymous, a confidential drug testing service of PharmChem Lahoratories, Inc. in Menlo Park, California, began operation in 1972 as a pub­ lic service of the nonprofit PharmChem Research Foundation. It grew into one of the largest street drug testing labo"ratories in the world, but after 12 years and ri1ore than 21,000 drug samples, PharmChcm discontinued the anonymous service on May 31, 1984, 6 years after the Foundation con­ cluded it'> work. Public u.se of Analysis Anonymous from 1973 (data from 1972 are incomplete) through 1983 totaled 20,721 samples from the United States and a number of other countries. This total applies only to the most commonly used and abused drugs that are shown in Table 1. Drug popularity is dis­ cussed only as it relates to Analysis Anonymous