The tempting business of smart drugs: A concrete health risk

The so-called smart-drugs, plant-based substances used for centuries by diverse populations especially of Central America in strict ritualized shamanic context thanks to their psychotropic effects, from the nineties have had wide diffusion across Europe. In Italy smart-drugs business, by passing traditional clandestine labs and illicit channels, was possible by their availability in smart-shops appeared in Milan and Rome and moreover exploiting the ever-expanding internet system. Via the Internet avid surfers have found troublefree accessibility to smart-drugs at low cost with the advantage of difficulties in police control, anonymity and lack of regulations, too. In Italy, between 2001-2003, Postal Police has seized more than five hundred parcels containing suspicious botanical species and tablets sent after on-line purchases by a known Dutch Internet site to Italian buyers. The authors hereby present the results of toxicological analysis on these findings (1167), with evidence of active principles ascribable to different smart-drugs: salvinorine in Salvia divinorum; LSA (ergine) in seeds of Rivea corymbosa, Ipomea violacea, Argyreia nervosa, harmine and harmaline in Peganum harmala, mescaline in Lophophora Williamsii, psilocybin/psilocin in Copelandia Cyanescens, Psilocybe Tampanensis, Psilocybe Cubensis, Philosophers Stones, ephedrine and yohimbine in several pharmaceutical products. Considering smart-drugs an unknown hazard and a potential emerging drug of abuse we give a general overview of the possible psychoactive effects of the most widely used smart drugs in their various forms of intake and their possible harms on man. Furthermore we illustrate the most recent trade restrictions adopted in Italy to limit their diffusion via the Internet.