"Ketamine is still used in developing countries as an emergency anaesthetic."<p>Actually, it is on the <i>WHO Model List of Essential Medicines</i> <<a href="http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/93142/1/EML_18_eng.pdf?ua=1>" rel="nofollow">http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/93142/1/EML_18_eng....</a> and used frequently and routinely in emergency procedures around the world, not just in "developing countries".
Certainly a fascinating slant on ketamine, more familiar to me from reports documenting benefit in patients with severe, treatment-resistant depression. In clinical applications the dose is very small vs. street use and not associated with the destructive gut and brain side effects described in the article. However it's not innocuous, hallucinations or psychosis, among other side-effects, are known, non-trivial risks.<p>It has been a drug of abuse in the US, but nothing like the near-epidemic proportions going on in China. If the article is accurately describing conditions over there, it suggests it's probably only a matter of time before we'll see it in N. America.<p>Kind of ironic in a way. Here in Oregon cannabis is now legal for recreational use, and other states will probably join the handful that permit sale and possession of the drug. Widespread abuse of ketamine with harmful outcomes might inspire a new round of a "war on drugs" just as unnecessary controls on cannabis are being reduced.<p>Perhaps it might lead us to think that not all "recreational" drugs should be regarded as harmless or the same as others, and one set of rules does not fit all.<p>Edit: fix grammar.
The thing I dislike about this article, as somebody who as experiment with ketamine (I took it twice two years ago, and then twice last month) is that the article's presentation implicitly vilifies ketamine a tad.
The writing in this piece is horrible.<p>"Free parties were popping up all over the country, and there were many in Bristol. That's when ketamine came flooding into the city."<p>Differentiation? Anybody? As far as I am concerned these so called "Free parties", aka outdoor raves, exist in most places of the world, as they cater for a basic human need to have a good time. Now when people enjoy themselves, they tend to drink, smoke and use various consumerables. We know Ketamine is big in the UK. Now how are non commercial social events connected to Ketamine?
"Sometimes, they would use motorcycles to surround the police, threatening them with AK47 rifles and grenades."<p>Very, very unlikely. China has an almost complete ban on civilian ownership of firearms. The only exception is for rare hunting permits (there is very little hunting in China) and wildlife conservation. Even then traditional hunting tends to use blackpowder muzzle loaders (and they restrict ownership of black/gun powder)<p>They don't even allow regular cops to use useful firearms (they are issued a revolver that fires rounds with as much energy as a .22 LR ... enough to wound but not kill or even stop someone attacking police). They don't want the cops ever rebelling against the PLA.<p>The BBC wants us to believe that Chinese authorities allowed an armed militia to directly challenge law enforcement and did nothing about it for over a decade?<p>More likely that was just a story made up by bribed cops, cops who were shit scared of going into that village or cops/politicians who wanted extra credit for going into that village.<p>So I wonder how much else of this story is exaggerated by the journalist.<p>Fully automatic AK ownership, and even grenade ownership is fully legal in many or most US states, if you pay the required BATFE taxes and have the right permits (explosive storage permits for grenades) but so much wave one at a cop and you will be surrounded by armored cars and black helicopters sooner that you can blink.
The way this is constructed reminds me of "Snow Fall" from the NYT. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2012/snow-fall/#/?part=tunnel-creek" rel="nofollow">http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2012/snow-fall/#/?part=tunne...</a>
Great story. Some of these content pieces are becoming massive! I mean, that story was so large I wonder if they considered turning it into a short book, or expanding it into one and publishing?