What's in the Water?

Scientists discover in an unusual way that cocaine using Italians may not be telling the truth about how much they snort. Will we soon see DEA agents in hip boots at a sewage plant near you?

Comments

[Adam]

We tried to bar the DEA from spending money on medical marijuana prosecutions. Why not try to bar them from spending money on hip boots? And then encourage the research so that they end up waist deep in shit, in their street clothes. Principles be damned, I'm all for spending tax money on that.

[Anvilwyrm]

So, people are *lying* about there drug use on questionaires?

*gasp*

[Anvilwyrm]

ARGH! *Their* drug use!

[OPUS]

You are what you pee.

[Marc]

The data is already there. EPA testing for pollutants could be used to look for drugs. I used to run the tests (EPA methods 624 and 625) with a GC/Mass Spectrometer, we could see what everyone was doing legal and illegal (caffeine, acetaminophen, ibuprofen, etc.). Would not take much to go back look at the data and make estimates.

[Nobody Important]

The government will require this technology

http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/gadgets/pistake-urinal-for-when-you-have-to-know-113078.php

in all toilets. If drugs are detected, the toilet will contact the proper authorities.

[Jennifer]

If Nobody Important's invention-link becomes a hit, I predict that outhouses will make a comeback.

[Adam]

The data is already there. EPA testing for pollutants could be used to look for drugs. I used to run the tests (EPA methods 624 and 625) with a GC/Mass Spectrometer, we could see what everyone was doing legal and illegal (caffeine, acetaminophen, ibuprofen, etc.). Would not take much to go back look at the data and make estimates.

So the DEA won't have to get waist-deep in shit? That takes all of the fun out of it.

Just out of curiousity, Marc, what does the EPA do with this wealth of knowledge?

[NoStar]

How do those Po'folks afford all that cocaine?

[David Macharelli]

They save money by letting their mullets grow in!

[Marc]

The EPA does not have the data. The two tests listed use a mass selective detector. The detector scans for compounds in a certain mass weight range. For each of the tests there are literally ten of thousands of compounds in the range, but only 35 compounds are reported to the EPA. The other compounds are there, but not reported. The test data needs to be stored for at least 7 years by the lab that performed it (either state or private), so a researcher could go back andd analyze the data looking for those compounds and come up with an estimate. Would not take alot of effort.

[Swede]

NoStar,

Your line is my nomination for "Best Geography Related Joke at Hit and Run" for the year! Outstanding!

[dead_elvis]

How do those Po'folks afford all that cocaine?

*groan* 😉

[John]

Yeah,

Its only poor folks who use cocaine and illegal drugs. You will never find anyone snorting in the bathroom of a law office or corporate headquarters or anything. Those billions of dollars that the cartels in Columbia make all come from guys selling plasma and working minimum wage jobs. Of course its the poor who always seem to get arrested for drugs, so it must be only them who use drugs.

[Twba]

John,

Are you implying that many illicit drugs are being used by productive members of our society?

[The Wine Commonsewer]

Anvylwyrm, you may well appreciate their drug problem once you know who they is.

still something wrong with the Colonel's site so when you click the link and get there scroll down a bit.

[The Wine Commonsewer]

Anvylwyrm, please disregard that last comment...I misread what you were saying. I thought you were giving someone crap for using 'their' instead of 'he/she' and thought you would be amused by my friend's (Col Hogan) anti-their screed. Duh.

[s.m. koppelman]

Is the metabolite produced only through cocane use, or can it be produced by, say, cocaine that's been flushed down a toilet interacting with other compounds and organisms in the sewage?

[Ruthless]

Aren't most of us missing the real story here, namely that drug usage is so prevalent that even drug warriors seem to be wanting to keep it a secret?

[Ruthless]

Come to think of it, if the WoD is ever ended, the warriors may want more of this kind of research done to "prove" how much drug usage shall have increased, because of the ending of the WoD. That would explain why they are suppressing the news now.