Pubdate: Sun, 01 Apr 2012 Source: Times, The (Gainesville, GA) Copyright: 2012 Gainesville Times Contact: http://www.gainesvilletimes.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2701 Author: Lee Johnson 'SPICE' HAS POTENTIAL TO BE DEADLY 'Spice' has potential to be deadly 16-year-old drowned in hot tub after using drug Although synthetic marijuana is fairly new to the drug landscape and many of its long-term dangers are not known, many familiar with the drug and its consequences know the potential threats of use - even once. The most widely publicized case to-date was Chase Burnett, a 16-year-old who was found dead in his parents' hot tub after smoking the substance in early March. The law, passed last week, was named Chase's Law in memory of the young man. "It's pretty nasty stuff," said Dr. Gaylord Lopez, Georgia Poison Center director. "We've been getting calls and despite legal efforts to ban sales, we've seen our numbers go up." He said they received about 50 calls in 2010 from doctors and emergency rooms with patients showing symptoms related to the drug. In 2011, however, that number rose to 350. "You see kids going to the ER and ICU and you never see that with marijuana," Lopez said. The long-term effects are not well known, but smoking synthetic marijuana once can result in an elevated heart rate, elevated blood pressure, severe nervous system complications, seizures, tremors, vomiting, irritability, hallucinations, confusion and more. "We're really concerned about what these, what I call, dorm room chemists are doing with this stuff, whether it's trying to alter the compounds to skirt legal issues or not," said Lopez. " They're adding stuff to the mixture that no one knows about." Those elevated heart rates common with synthetic marijuana can be life-threatening. "When you get those high heart rates, then the body can throw the heart into various arrhythmias or irregular rhythms," Lopez said. "These are the things that become more life-threatening." The director says the THC alternatives can be attractive because of their visibility, or lack thereof, on noninvasive drug screenings. "One of the more attractive things about this is that it is often times undetected in drug screens," he said. "Here you have a situation where you have some people who get the marijuana-like high, you have some people who get the marijuana-like high times 10 or 20, but then you get these people who get these aforementioned affects and then they start having problems, major problems." The chemicals used to mimic marijuana are not tested on animals or humans, and can come from anywhere or anyone. "Who knows what contaminants may be in this stuff," Lopez said. The poison center and Lopez have been keen to the drug "for awhile now," and have been advocates and resources for lawmakers. And with the usage becoming a rising trend, Lopez says it's important to educate the public on the potential dangers. According to the American Association of Poison Control Centers, the number of synthetic related calls in the United States more than doubled from 2010 to 2011. "From what I'm hearing, you can't keep the stuff on the shelves," said Lopez. With the rising frequency of usage, the chances more deaths like Chase's could occur. "When someone has arrhythmias that are not controllable by standard drugs, then you put a patient at risk and in some cases there could be fatal outcomes," Lopez said. "It's pretty nasty."