Users use first aid more often

The number of people who end up receiving treatment after taking too much GHB has exploded. This is what doctors say in the emergency departments of the hospitals of Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Utrecht, Nijmegen and Haarlem and the Dutch Association of Emergency Medical Services (NVSHA) NRC . Patients enter the hospital in a comatose state and are often unable to be awakened in any way whatsoever. Sometimes they have to deal with ventilation.

At OLVG Hospital in Amsterdam, the number of entries has increased from 50 in 2014 to 133 in 2017. In Diakonessenhuis (Utrecht) and Radboudumc (Nijmegen) in 2017 about 120 and 100 users of ghb landed on first aid, the figures of previous years were much lower. In Rotterdam, the number of intoxications in the ghb has increased slightly, according to the emergency physicians of the Franciscus Gasthuis. Accurate numbers are not available, says physician Arthur Rosendaal.

What stands out: most users are between 20 and 30 years old. The majority is made up of leisure users. According to doctors, they underestimated the effect of the ghb because the drug is difficult to dose. Femke Gresnigt, an OLVG emergency physician: "One milliliter too much and you have an overdose." They are therefore more likely to have problems than with other drugs.

Intoxication

In 2016, about 40,000 Dutch took medication about 390,000 ctc, according to the Trimbos Institute. The number of health-related incidents reported at the Drug Incident Monitoring Center in 2017 differs little from one to the other: 1,300 and 1,700, or nearly six thousand incidents drug. It is only a fraction of the actual number of incidents, as only a very limited number of emergency services and ambulances share their information. According to the Trimbos Institute, the level of ghb poisoning is extremely high, which is significantly higher than with other drugs. 85% of patients in emergency care are reduced or inaccessible.

Relaxed and less anxious

Users take ghb because they are relaxed and less anxious; intoxication is compared with the effect of alcohol. The medicine is, say the doctors, readily available and relatively easy to manufacture by yourself; one of the ingredients is unblocker sink. The salty substance is also cheap: a quarter of a liter costs about 35 euros. A novice user can receive more than 100 doses. It attracts young people, says Ties Eikendal, Radboudumc Emergency Department Physician and NVSHA President. As a result, usage becomes more and more normal. "It's the hip.In Nijmegen it is only used in the publication."

The Trimbos Institute recognizes the normalization of drug use and notes an increase in the number of incidents related to drug addicts. A girl was recently brought in, said David Baden, an emergency physician from Diakonessenhuis in Utrecht, who left at a birthday party because she had taken too much. "His friends were very light about it."

Doctors worry about this evolution. Ghb creates a strong addiction and the unique use can also have serious consequences, such as stopping breathing.

Institutions have been fighting against chronic ghb users for some time now. A study by Radboud University Nijmegen revealed that 50 to 70% of users of the drug were again consumed after three months.

Read also: GHB addiction is the most difficult to treat