Pubdate: Tue, 12 Jan 1999 Source: Fresno Bee, The (CA) Copyright: 1999 The Fresno Bee Contact: http://www.fresnobee.com/ BLUE NITRO CAN CAUSE COMMAS, [sic] OFFICIALS WARN Dietary Supplement Is Used By Many To Create Sexual Euphoria. Available in vitamin stores and sex shops, Blue Nitro is promoted as a dietary supplement while being purchased for its side effects, including the ability to create sexual euphoria. Police and medical professionals have warned that the green, minty potion, which has become increasingly popular in San Francisco, can be dangerous. On Wednesday, officials from the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Food and Drug Administration and the Poison Control Center plan an information session to describe the problems some people have experienced after drinking Blue Nitro. Blue Nitro, also sold as Vitality, has the same chemical composition as gamma-hydroxybutyrate, one of several date-rape drugs, police spokesman Sherman Ackerson said. Commonly put in beverages, GHB gives users a feeling of euphoria, but when combined with alcohol or in an overdose, it can result in coma and other serious respiratory problems. The same is true of Blue Nitro, said Jo Ellen Dyer, a pharmacist with the California Poison Control System. "My concern is that I don't want someone walking around thinking this is the latest form of vitamin C that can cure the common cold," she said. "This is GHB, it can hurt people, and they shouldn't do it." Dyer said there have been at least a half-dozen emergency room visits involving Blue Nitro throughout California since December, shortly after marketers legally distributed samples to individuals and sex shops in San Francisco. Distributor Rick Alvarez said Blue Nitro, manufactured by the West Palm Beach, Fla., company Alpha Earth Inc., is safe and is no drug. He said it is a dietary supplement that must be used with great caution to avoid side effects. It is not to be sold to anyone under the age of 21. "This product, when taken properly, does not have any negative side effects," Alvarez told the San Francisco Examiner from his home in Miami. Alvarez noted that FDA officials in Florida, Alabama and Georgia have purchased several bottles and sent inspectors down to the manufacturing plant since the product was first created in August and have yet to halt its production. - --- MAP posted-by: Patrick Henry