Posted on 04/03/2006 7:45:26 PM PDT by aculeus
Doctors from London University have revealed details of what they believe is the largest amount of ecstasy ever consumed by a single person. Consultants from the addiction centre at St George's Medical School, London, have published a case report of a British man estimated to have taken around 40,000 pills of MDMA, the active ingredient in ecstasy, over nine years. The heaviest previous lifetime intake on record is 2,000 pills. Though the man, who is now 37, stopped taking the drug seven years ago, he still suffers from severe physical and mental health side-effects, including extreme memory problems, paranoia, hallucinations and depression. He also suffers from painful muscle rigidity around his neck and jaw which often prevents him from opening his mouth. The doctors believe many of these symptoms may be permanent.
The man, known as Mr A in the report in the scientific journal Psychosomatics, started using ecstasy at 21. For the first two years his use was an average of five pills per weekend. Gradually this escalated until he was taking around three and a half pills a day. At the peak, the man was taking an estimated 25 pills every day for four years. After several severe collapses at parties, Mr A decided to stop taking ecstasy. For several months, he still felt he was under the influence of the drug, despite being bedridden.
Hallucinations
His condition deteriorated and he began to experience recurrent tunnel vision and other problems including hallucinations, paranoia and muscle rigidity. "He came to us after deciding that he couldn't go on any more," said Dr Christos Kouimtsidis, the consultant psychiatrist at St George's Medical School in Tooting who treated him for five months. "He was having trouble functioning in everyday life."
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
. . . and he didn't notice this for nine years?
Active alcoholics end up the same way. A drug is a drug is a drug when you abuse it. Legalize it and at least we could have collected taxes on a guy like this for the nine years he was using!
I found the appropriate video clip entirely by accident. Click on the one at the bottom.
http://www.vistalites.com/downloads/
Shouldn't that be "Mr. X"?
Holy crap! He isn't having "complications," he just hasn't come down yet.
5 years ago this week i had a blood alcohol level of .34 a day after my last drink spent a week in the Hospital and 90 days in rehab and a year in sober living One does bulid a tolerence to drugs and alcohol
Just in case all of that might make you think drugs may not be helpful, they've saved this for last.
congratulations!
Drug laws don't convince people to deal with their problems, for the majority of people. It's the other coonsequences that lead them to rehab...so lets legalize drugs , tax it and spend the $ on rehabs.
"Eh... It's cool"
Just think how many he would have taken if it was legal!
I wonder how he'd being doing if he had 12 drinks per day for 9 years?
How would he have fared on that many sugar pills (or salt pills.) Teach the controversy about the Placebo Effect.
It pretty much is legal in England, I studied there back in 1999, go into any club and there are kids openly dealing. It is pretty laughable.
Sounds impossible to me actually. 12 a day ? He'd be long dead.
Legalize it and at least we could have collected taxes on a guy like this for the nine years he was using!
&&
The Brits might have a problem with our taxing their citizens, doncha' think?
Sigh. I guess I should have put a big fat "this is sarcasm" note in my comment. I didn't imagine there were FReepers who would use this grotesque case to actually argue for legalization. .
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