Texas news station KRGV is warning that a growing number of teens in the area are using cough syrup to get high.

A relatively new twist on this trend is that many teens are mixing prescription cough syrup (containing promethazine and codeine) with Sprite to create a drug beverage referred to as "Purple" or "Lean".

"It is very common now, but it's very dangerous," a former "Purple" abuser told KRGV. "It's addicting. I woke up at a house. I did not know where it was. I was coughing, just coughing. One time, I coughed up blood."

Pharmacist, Buddy De La Rosa told KRGV that "Purple" is highly addictive because of the main ingredient, codeine. "The euphoria, the good feeling you get from too much codeine, causes you to want to have that effect again, so you search for the drug," De La Rosa said.

Previous reports have indicated that teen abuse of cough syrup can result in a wide range of negative health consequences, including death.

Labels: cough_syrup, over-the-counter-drugs

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After four 10th-graders in Pennsylvania were hospitalized this week with drug reactions, experts and police are looking into the sale of "snurf pills" on the Internet.

The children bought the drugs from an online store that marketed the Snurfs as a natural remedy composed of three herbs - Fevizia, Palenzia and De la Amazon. However, no such herbs exist.

Available online since 2005, snurfs may contain Dextromethorphan, an ingredient in over-the-counter cough suppressants such as Robitussin.

Dextromethorphan is very popular among the youngest teens, according to Dr. Deborah Levine of New York's Bellevue Hospital. She said that middle-schoolers often take many times the recommended dose of cough syrups, risking serious toxicities.

"Talk to your kids," Dr. Levine said. "They should know these are serious medicines. Injuries and deaths can occur."

Labels: cough_syrup, drug_abuse, internet

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The recreational abuse of cough suppressants such NyQuil to  is becoming a relatively common form of adolescent substance abuse. As a result, the FDA was considering whether to control them via prescriptions -- but for the time being, such regulation will not take place.

“The FDA advisory panel recognized that abuse was a concern in adolescents, but decided that DXM [dextromethorphan] was not enough of a threat to general public health to warrant its classification within the Controlled Substance Act, which would have allowed states to consider it for prescription-use only.” [Source: National Examiner]

Though products containing DXM won’t be listed as controlled substances, the FDA considered the possibility of requiring drug stores to keep the products behind the counter. The committee is also considering instituting a minimum age requirement for purchases.

 

Labels: cough_syrup, over-the-counter-drugs

Posted By: Stefanie Hamilton 0 Comments