Lena Lunsford Investigated for Dangerous Drug 'Bath Salts' - WBOY-TV

CLARKSBURG -

Her daughter has been missing almost two months, and last week Lena Lunsford released a statement asking people to pray for her family and daughter Aliayah, 3. She also wrote she is fully cooperating with the investigators working to bring Aliayah home.

But the same can't be said for the authorities handling her six charges of federal welfare fraud. U.S. Pretrial Services Officer Brian Kilgore wrote in a statement that Lunsford is violating her probation and is not fully cooperating with her supervision. West Virginia State Police tracked her and her husband Ralph Lunsford to the parking lot of a store called Hot Stuff Cool Things in Clarksburg Nov. 1. Ralph told Kilgore he had just purchased "Sextary," a version of the synthetic drug "bath salts" for $52. Lena told Kilgore on Oct. 20 she did not know what bath salts were. She also told him she had not been to a "head shop" in "several months."

"It's much like the PCP back in the '70s. It's a medicine that makes someone very euphoric and happy. But there's a fine line for them to go over to being acutely psychotic," said Dr. Chris Goode, head of the Emergency Department at United Hospital Center.

But if a pregnant mother is taking the synthetic drugs, it will have an impact on her unborn child(ren).

"It'll affect breathing issues and then the central nervous system," Goode said. "You can only imagine the effect it'd have on the nervous system and the mother. If the mother is not doing well, then the fetus is not doing well."

State Police are investigating the bath salts incident and is waiting on lab results. Neither she nor Ralph has been charged. 

Kilgore recommended she be placed in home incarceration and substance abuse treatment.

Meanwhile, Dr. Chris Goode calls bath salts an "epidemic" in north central West Virginia.

"We see it a lot. People are known regular users. But one bad dose of bath salts, heroin or K2 could be your last."

Lena Lunsford has a bond revocation hearing at Elkins federal court Nov. 28.

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Hospitals on alert for victims of new drug 'bath salts' - Herald Sun

MELBOURNE hospitals are warning their emergency departments to expect admissions of patients affected by a controversial new drug MDPV, known on the street as bath salts.

The synthetic drug, which can be snorted, injected or smoked, is derived from mephedrone. It is reported to have effects similar to ecstasy and cocaine but can cause psychotic-like symptoms.

Experts have warned the bath salts drug and other drugs derived from mephedrone including meow meow and plant food have significant health risks.

The drug can result in psychosis, insomnia and paranoia and has been linked to deaths in Britain. Users experience a powerful sense of euphoria, increased energy, sociability, and sexual stimulation.

Geoff Munro, policy and advocacy director for the Australian Drug Foundation, said there had been limited research into the drug.

The drug has been linked to several violent, psychotic episodes overseas. It is widely available online and though illegal in Australia, the importation of bath salts from overseas websites remains possible.

sVictoria Police acknowledge that synthetic drugs represent a major challenge to law enforcement.

Lez Twentyman said that the increasing popularity of synthetic drugs such as bath salts was a result of drug addiction being treated as an enforcement issue not a community health issue.

Mr Twentyman said that the availability of drugs online has resulted in increasing levels of drug taking among Victorian youth.

He said often ingredients of drugs bought online were unclear.

"People don't really know what they're taking," he said.

A spokeswoman for the Royal Melbourne Hospital said that the number of people admitted for drug related medical issues would almost certainly rise during summer.

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Dorchester County drops 'bath salts' bill - Charleston Post Courier

SUMMERVILLE -- The effort to ban narcotic "bath salts" in Dorchester County sank quietly away this week.

The proposed law died on the brink of a second preliminary vote because the state has already banned the over-the-counter designer drugs.

Photo by Grace Beahm

County Council approved the ban in a unanimous first preliminary vote in October; the law would have taken three votes. But County Administrator Jason Ward told council on Monday there was no point in pursuing it, because the county is enforcing the state law. Council members nodded quietly and moved to the next agenda item.

Abuse of the store-bought drugs seemed to spike out of nowhere in the county this year. The drugs are crystal or powder substance that mimic illegal drugs, reportedly causing rapid heart rate, severe panic attacks, hallucinations, seizures and psychosis. The symptoms can be fatal.

Since January, Dorchester EMS crews and sheriff's deputies have chased dozens of calls, such as a "hyper-excited" person tearing off clothes and running down the street naked.

The state had delayed acting on a ban while waiting for the federal Drug Enforcement Administration to relist the drugs as Schedule 1 narcotics, a move that would ban their use as medicine and remove them from store shelves nationwide. But the state acted after the DEA put an emergency ban on the drugs.

Reach Bo Petersen at 937-5744 or follow him on Twitter at @bopete.

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Pols look at state ban on intoxicating 'bath salts' - Boston Herald

Her face red and hot with tears, Lindsey Semple described Thursday how bath salts - the name for a new, potent designer drug - had derailed her life, cost her two jobs, drained her savings and nearly killed her.

"At work, I would be shaky and pale from staying up up to 72 hours straight," she told lawmakers at a State House hearing. "I got suicidal and very paranoid."

Although she described being "clean for about two months," Semple convulsed in tears when she described her family’s intervention to get her off of a drug that can be purchased legally in Massachusetts.

Semple’s testimony stirred members of the Committee on the Judiciary, whose chairman, Rep. Eugene O’Flaherty (D-Chelsea), promised to "expeditiously" consider legislation that would classify "bath salts" as a Class C narcotic. O’Flaherty noted a recent decision by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to classify bath salts as an illegal substance would provide guidance to states considering action on the issue.

"The federal government has given a clear indication that this has risen to a level where it needs some attention," O’Flaherty told the News Service after the hearing. "It certainly raises the bar here for us to act on it expeditiously."

O’Flaherty’s co-chair, Sen. Cynthia Creem (D-Newton), said, "It seems to me it’s something we really ought to be looking at."

In addition, a senator revealed that the committee he co-chairs is preparing to unveil legislation that would empower the state commissioner of public health to declare any substance a "public health hazard" and put it on a "schedule" of illegal substances until a permanent determination is made.

"Our concern beyond [bath salts] is, once this is made illegal, what’s next?" said Sen. John Keenan (D-Quincy), co-chair of the Committee on Mental Health and Substance Abuse. Keenan said other modern substances - "There’s salvia out there, K2, bath salts" - lend themselves to a rapid response from the Department of Public Health.

The bath salts bill (H 3739) was filed by Rep. George Ross, a freshman Republican from Attleboro, who testified that the drug has been "flying just under the radar" of policymakers while poison control centers have reported a sharp spike in overdoses as a result of the product.

"I was floored by the severity and extent of the abuse," said Ross, a former police commissioner, noting that the product had been banned in 26 states and Great Britain.

Although bath salts share a name with a harmless product that consumers use for therapeutic purposes, backers of the legislation say that the drug has no legitimate consumer purpose and has been mislabeled to appear benign.

Ross told the News Service after the hearing that he hopes his colleagues act on the bill before they recess for seven weeks on Nov. 16.

"There’s no reason, if the committee’s in agreement to move this thing out, to consider it for the whole body," he said. "Every moment we waste, every second we waste, there’s a chance that somebody else is going to become addicted to this stuff. If we wait throughout the holidays, people are going to forget about it. You’ve got to strike while the iron’s hot."

Supporters of the bill say bath salts, which are often sold as household products, produce similar effects as cocaine or methamphetamines when snorted. Its effects include hallucination and paranoia, and it can cause a sharp rise in body temperature.

Rep. Randy Hunt (R-Sandwich) read a letter from a constituent who described her daughter’s own descent into a bath salts addiction, noting that they were available for purchase "in a store on Main Street in Hyannis." Rep. Elizabeth Poirier (R-North Attleboro) joined Hunt and Ross in support of the legislation, which has 23 co-sponsors.

Several police chiefs also described their experience dealing with abusers of bath salts, and they noted that the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration recently issued a temporary emergency order declaring bath salts a Class 1 drug.

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