How new synthetic drugs get banned

[Alfa]

There are several ways new synthetic drugs are detected by governments. Forensic laberatories and drug seizures are the most common. Some countries have drug test services for the public. When new drugs are found the analysis results are passed on to the National Focal Point of that country. It ispart of the EU "Early-warning on new synthetic drugs. Each EU member state has one. Then the following process starts:

When a new synthetic drug is first detected, detailed information on its production, traffic and use is sent by the EU Member States to the European Police Office (Europol) in The Hague and to the EMCDDA in Lisbon via the Europol National Units and the "reitox national focal points" respectively. This detailed information includes:

a chemical and physical description of the drug, including the name under which it is commonly known;
details of the frequency, circumstances and/or quantities in which the drug has been encountered;
a first indication of the possible risks involved, including health and social risks;
data on chemical precursors;
the mode and scope of established or expected use of the drug as a psychotropic substance; and
other uses of the drug.

These data are passed on to the European Commission and to the London-based "European Agency for the Evaluation of Medicinal Products" (EMEA). A joint report by the EMCDDA and Europol is then forwarded to the Horizontal Working Party on Drugs (HWPD) of the Council of the European Union, providing the elements required for Phase 2 of the process.

Under the auspices of its Scientific Committee, the EMCDDA convenes a meeting with experts named by the Member States, Europol, the European Commission and the EMEA. This expert group assesses the possible risks of the newly identified synthetic drug and draws up a risk-assessment report based on its findings.A five-person sub-committee on risk assessment, composed of members of the EMCDDA's Scientific Committee, was set up in November 1997 to prepare the risk-assessment process by developing guidelines setting out the optimal means of assessing the health and social risks of new synthetic drugs. These guidelines, adopted in November 1998, will form the basis of all future risk-assessment procedures undertaken by the EMCDDA in the framework of the Joint Action and will continue to be modified in future in line with new experience and additional knowledge. The "Guidelines for the Risk Assessment of New Synthetic Drugs" were published by the EMCDDA in August 1999.

If a drug is assessed as being harmful, the Council of the European Union may - within a month of receiving the risk-assessment report described in Phase 2 - unanimously adopt a decision defining the synthetic drug which is to be placed under control measures.While the Joint Action provides the European Union with a flexible and rapid mechanism for tackling synthetic drugs, it does not prevent any Member State from maintaining or introducing on its territory any national control measure it deems appropriate once it has identified a new synthetic drug.





A far more easy way of banning a substance is by the EU 65/65/EEC directive. In a nutshell this means that a product that has notherapeutical propertiescan still be considered a medicinal product. Anything ment for human ingestion can be considered a medicine. The penalty in the Netherlands for im/exporting, making, trading, etc is € 45.000,00 or 6 years in jail. This was the end of RC's marketed for human consumption and the end of proper user information.