Source: Newcastle Herald (Australia) Contact: Fax: +61 2 4979 5888 Website: http://www.nnp.com.au/html/herald_index.html Pubdate: Tue, 8 Dec 1998 Author: Ellen Connolly LAST RITES AFTER HERB INJECTION Drug misuse backfires on 3 THREE teenagers almost died after overdosing on a herbal product sold to them at Newcastle's King St Fair on Sunday. Tha girl and two male friends bought a $13 jar of the popular herbal powder guarana from a stall holder, whom they asserted told them the product was a 'herbal and legal speed'. Speed, or amphetamine, in an illegal widely injected in the Hunter. Despite directions on the container stating that the herbal preparation was designed to be taken orally, the three chose instead to inject it. Within 30 minutes they were suffering severe headaches, fever, rapid pulse rate and high blood pressure. Vomiting and diarrhoea followed. A fourth teenager, who chose not to experiment with the drung because she was pregnant, telephoned for an ambulance. The three were admitted to the Mater Hospital, with the girl placed in intensive care in a critical condition. Speaking from their hospital beds yesterday, they warned others that if herbal products were not taken as directed on the label they could kill. 'It's very dangerous. We're lucky to be alive,' said the girl, who gave her name as 'Michelle'. 'The doctors thought I was going to die and they gave me the last rites.' Doctors estimate the three took up to 10 times the recommended dosage on the label. The product, called Herbal Extreme, was a brown powder and contained guarana, ginseng and cola nut, none of which was prohibited. It contains between 3% and 5% caffeine. It is distributed by a Murwillumbah-based firm, Legal Highs, whose owner, Mr Ray Thorpe, described it as 'a herbal drink'. 'We are anti-injection and anti-chemicals ... ,' he said. 'It's not a drug, it's a health tonic, an energy boost. I've been selling it for five years and never heard of it used this way.' Michelle said she and her friends dissolved the powder in water and then injected it. She said the pvoduct had been described to them as 'legal, cheap speed'. 'We were just experimenting. We didn't think it would almost kill us,' she said. Senior staff specialist in toxicology at the Mater Hospital, Dr Ian Whyte said the three could have died if they had not been treated at hospital. 'Taken intravenously in big doses like that it can be lethal and can bring on heart attacks and strokes,' Dr Whyte said. - --- Checked-by: Joel W. Johnson