V is for ‘Vitamin K’ (or Ketamine)
The Dublin rap duo Versatile, aka Casper Walsh and Eskimo Supreme’s track “Ketamine” took off on YouTube in 2018 hitting the number one slot in Ireland and racking up over 200k views in a matter of days.
It’s pretty catchy, but not surprisingly, with a title like “Ketamine” it’s full of drug references and the kind of language that would make a docker blush, it wasn’t going receive any airtime in the mainstream.
The pair may present themselves as ‘hardcore’ Dublin drug dealers, although tweets and facebook posts from former classmates during a latin class in a private school from a few years previously may present an alternative version of the truth.
It seems that ketamine has moved in time from a relatively ordinary anesthetic product to one at the heart of Dublin’s drug scene.
First synthesized in the early 1960’s by a Professor of Chemistry at an American university its anesthetic properties were initially tested on animals and later human prisoners.
These clinical tests demonstrated that ketamine's could be used for shorter time-limited situations and possessed less unwanted side-effects compared to other commonly available anesthetic products that were available at the time.
The researchers were going to call the state of ketamine induced state anesthesia "dreaming" but the pharmaceutical involved in the development were not keen on that idea. This dissociative state is characterised by a sense of detachment from one's physical body and the external world. Some apply terms such as depersonalization (the feeling that you’re observing yourself from outside of your body) and derealization (a feeling that thing around you aren’t real) to the collection of sensations it produces.
It is said that after hearing about this naming problem of the "disconnected" appearance of the patients, the wife of one of the pharmacologists working on ketamine suggested "dissociative anesthesia". FDA approval followed in 1970 and Ketamine anesthesia was first given to American soldiers during the Vietnam War.
Used on severely injured people, it appeared to be safe for use with this group. Following use in Vietnam it became widely used for emergency surgery in field hospitals in war zones elsewhere.
It is seen as especially useful for short-term procedures when muscle relaxation is not required. The effect of ketamine on the respiratory and circulatory systems is different from that of other anesthetics as it suppresses breathing much less than most. When used at anesthetic doses, ketamine usually stimulates rather than depresses the circulatory system but the protective airway reflexes are preserved.
Due to these useful characteristics its use in human medicine continues to the present day. This usefulness means that despite three World Health Organization (WHO) reviews and a request from China to place ketamine in schedule I of the Convention on Psychotropic Substances it remains in a lower category of control. It was judged that the medical benefits of ketamine far outweigh its potential harm through recreational misuse. In addition, such stricter scheduling would make it more difficult for poorer countries to obtain similar medicines.
Another side of ketamine’s properties only came to light in the year 2000 when researchers began to notice its anti-depressive effects. Some have described this discovery as the single most important advance in the treatment of depression in over 50 years. As such it has shifted the direction of antidepressant research and development.
A Russian doctor Evgeny Krupitsky also claims to have obtained encouraging results by using ketamine as part of a treatment for alcohol use disorder, which combines both psychedelic and aversive techniques.
Ketamine tends to me more well known for its use in the veterinary world. It is commonly used for its anaesthetic and analgesic effects on cats, dogs, rabbits, and other small animals. It’s use with larger animals such as horses is of particular note. It has led to a number of slang phrases for the drug, such as ‘donkey wobbler’. This link is often made when the media report on ketamine, sometimes adding jokey headlines such as ‘Just say neigh!’, an unhelpful choice that can hide the seriousness of ketamine’s effects. Rather weirdly ketamine does not appear to produce sedation or anesthesia in snails. In fact it does just the opposite as it appears to have an excitatory effect. Quite how you tell is something of a mystery; it must have been a slow week at the laboratory.
Ketamine is a complex drug with potent anaesthetic, analgesic, stimulant and psychedelic properties. It can be injected, snorted, ingested or smoked in a variety of forms. With higher doses comes the potential paralytic effects (known as going through the ‘K-Hole’) that give a sensation of detachment from body and surroundings with a ‘floating, out-of-body’ experience. This is usually accompanied by visual and auditory hallucinations. The effects are ketamine are short-lived and tolerance to the drug quickly develops. Users may seek larger and more frequent doses to experience the same effects. Ketamine also has a tenuous reputation as a ‘safe’ drug, with limited potential for overdose or dependence and few side effects.
Some drug users may inadvertently use ketamine as it is often used to ‘cut’ cocaine or ecstasy (MDMA) or sold as a fake version of those drugs.
Although the risk of overdose may be relatively low, ketamine use has been implicated in deaths globally. Figures can be difficult to obtain, but one study showed that there were more than 90 deaths in England and Wales in the years of 2005–2013 associated with ketamine use. Such fatalities include accidental poisonings, drownings, traffic accidents, and suicides. The majority of these deaths were among young people.
A key long-term effect of continued ketamine use is Ketamine bladder syndrome (KBS), also known as ketamine cystitis. Those with the condition will feel the need to urinate frequently. It occurs because the bladder has been damaged – ketamine causes structural damage to cells in this part of the body, leading to a lowering of the capacity of the bladder. This can result in an urgent need to urinate frequently, incontinence, pelvic pain and the possibility of blood appearing in the urine.
The use of ketamine as a recreational drug has been rising steadily since the early 1990’s. In some countries researchers have noted that it is as cheap and easy for some teenagers to obtain as cigarettes and alcohol. Commonly used at rave parties, it is known as a “club drug”. Street names have been varied over the years, but include slang such as “Cat Valium”, “Jet K”, “Kit Kat”, “Special K”, “Super K” and “Vitamin K.” This form of marketing also extends to when it is sold as a mixture with another drug. The most common combination is with cocaine, commonly called “CK”,”CK1” or “Calvin Klein”. As ketamine is considerably cheaper than cocaine it reduces the price to the end user as well as increasing the range of effects felt.
Ketamine is mainly produced in pharmaceutical factories, usually based in India. With lax security and endemic corruption certain factories have illegally put millions of tonnes onto the black market. At times authorities organise a ‘crackdown’ on those factories that are running an illegal ‘night-shift’ or are complicit in some of their product entering the illegal supply chain. Users around the world may then experience serious price-hikes or choose to switch to drugs such as Methoxetamine (“Mexxy”) that mimic the effects of ketamine.
Although there is some more straightforward illegal production of ketamine, notably in China, it remains the case that if there was sufficient political will the supply of ketamine onto the black market could be reduced to negligible amounts. On the other hand the alternative drugs available for those seeking the sensations caused by ketamine use could be even more unpredictable, powerful and destructive.
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Tel: 091 48 00 44 Email: info@wrdatf.ie
