Get Your Phenibut Out of My Baclofen: The Drug War Snoozes Onwards

I've always been fascinated with the Drug War, the most intricate reverse-welfare scheme ever engineered. And frankly, marijuana has always been the dullest part of the story for me (with the obvious exception of synthetic cannabinoids), wrapped up in so much baby boomer nostalgia it almost seems square. No, I'm fascinated by the drug war's ever-evolving underbelly, the tunnels where activists don't dare to tread, populated by Mexican pharmacists, Chinese bulk-chemical distributors, vitamin-store juiceheads, paid-off psychiatrists, and Fijian corporate raiders. And, of course, their lobbyists. Gather around, and I will tell you a tale of the latest chapters in the never ending race to the bottom of human consciousness. The Great Downer Race!

All real sedatives have one thing in common: an ability to affect the receptors for a transmitter called gamma-Aminobutyric acid, or GABA. This is probably the 2nd most important neurotransmitter in the brain (after glutamate) and as a general rule tends to slow things down. If all the GABA in your brain stopped pumping, you would have a seizure pretty much instantly. I don't care how tough you are.

Please Note: This post does not constitute an endorsement of any of the sedatives described here. I'm not a medical practitioner, and you should consult your doctor, shaman, and mother-in-law before ingesting anything but kale or almond milk.

Alcohol acts on GABA but it also works on your brain in at least a half dozen other ways, which might explain why it is the most popular drug of all time. Most of the familiar actors on just GABA...benzos like xanax or klonopin or roofies, "zzzz" drugs like ambien, and barbituates (the stuff Don Draper takes), and chloral hydrate (one of the many things Anna Nicole Smith OD'd on) are all legal but not only require a doctor's prescription but are controlled by the DEA. A couple of them (GHB, Qualudes) are totally illegal (which isn't even true of meth, coke, or PCP).

With a few historical exceptions (the disco "lude" craze, date-rape hysterias) downers have always kind of flown under the radar compared to the big scourges of dope narcotics, crystal-whatever, Krishna-consciousness pills, and of course good old genetically-engineered super-skunk. Perhaps because the effects are so workingman pedestrian. They relieve stress, help you sleep, and maybe make you feel a little fuzzy in a non-threatening sort of way. Just don't take too much, or you might die. And don't stop taking them too fast. Or you might die. Kind of like our old friend alcohol.

Time was, in the not so distant past, there was one potent downer that had no DEA controls that was quite popular. Fairly appropriately, it's called Soma. Without DEA controls, Soma could be ordered online without a prescription in unlimited quantities from overseas pharmacies as legally as toothpaste. Folks have known about the abuse potential of Soma for a very long time, leading over a dozen states to control it independently, but the Federal government finally joined the club in January of this year. The reason it took so long? Lobbying by certain states, certain employers, and especially certain insurance providers who had a vested interest in controlling the price of workers compensation clams! See, Soma is considered a muscle relaxant (a meaningless kitchen-sink designation) along with many other drugs that are more expensive, don't work as well, or both. And controlled status is going to mean that lots of people with bad backs or other muscle spasms are going to be more expensive to treat. Who stands to benefit? King Pharmaceuticals--makers of Skelaxin, a drug that costs 8 times as much per dose and. . .get this. . .nobody has ANY IDEA how the drug works. 

Relaxed?

Good, it's about to get weirder. In the mid-80s the US passed a law called the Analog Act in order to curb designer drugs. The idea behind it was that any chemical with a similar structure to an illegal or very strictly controlled chemical was automatically illegal. It was mostly designed to combat psychedelics but came in handy "battling" some uber-potent synthetic opiates also. The problem is, because benzos are scheduled at a lower level than the Analog Act covers, benzo analogs remain totally legal and can be sold as bulk chemicals. So if I want a valium, I need to see a doctor who may or may not send me to a psychiatrist who may or may not first have me checked out by a therapist (who all need to be paid and all have the right to shrug, not write the prescription, and get paid anyways) before I go to a registered pharmacy for the privilege of buying it. But if I want a huge bag of phenazepam (a potent Soviet-bloc benzo), I just go here. Of course, I will have to check a box saying that it won't be used for human consumption, but it's still legalish. And the best part? No age limit. Because it's for my chemistry set, and it's important that children learn chemistry to compete in the world economy. They can also get practice using their digital scale, because a dose of phenazepam is just 2 milligrams! I'll be honest, I don't know if there are any lobbyists involved here, just a loophole so weird it would keep Nixon up at night if he weren't permanently hitting the big snooze button in the sky.

But what if you want something less quasi-legal and more. . .say. . .something you can buy on Amazon. 

Phenibut is considered a nutritional supplement (no, I really don't have any idea why) available at many healthfood stores. Not the kinds with hippies and six types of tea tree oil, but the type with two walls full of protein powders and products named to evoke the image of well-veined testicles. It was designed to replace another vitamin-aisle drug that actually did have a strong claim to belong there: GHB. See, GHB is a hormone naturally produced by your body (let's call it "god's date rape drug") that causes sedation but a whole lot of other crazy effects--one of which is increasing production of human growth hormone leading to muscle formation. Now, GHB is a bit of atypical sedative because it acts on the GABA-B receptor as well as the GABA-A receptor that our friends booze and benzos target. This accounts for it's unique capacity to cause amnesia when combined with high-dose alcohol. Now, as far as I know, Phenibut does not increase growth hormone but it does tag GABA-B. It has some weird features. First, it takes about 2 hours to kick in but it lasts a really long time. Second, on it's own it can work pretty well on anxiety but it is really not strong enough to deliver euphoria on it's own: that's why most recreational users tend to drink with it. It is probably the most effective OTC sleep aid available ever, and can be quite habit forming when used for this purpose. And lastly, if taken for long enough at Stallone doses it causes a withdrawal syndrome similar to GHB, which is not known to be fatal but can apparently involve seizures, "brain zaps", and make you want to die.

Kava on the other hand rightfully belongs on the shelves of healthfood stores, next to the bran fiber and the placenta extract. But the real scam is that, despite the fact that a culture was based around the use of kava as an intoxicant for hundreds of years, the kava capsules at Whole Foods might as well contain eraser shavings. To get the real thing you have to go online and buy the powder, which tastes like clean dirt (yes, you heard me) and will numb your mouth like nothing you have ever experienced. It's a hell of a strange way to circumvent the pharmaceutical monopoly, but sometimes people do things just because they can. Or, because they hate doctors, or hate lying to doctors, or hate being labelled for life with preexisting conditions. There's always that. I can't tell the story of the weird capitalist cowboys that brought real kava to Americans better than others already have (it kind of reminds me of the Five Hour Energy story), but I have to give them mad kudos for dodging the prohibitionist machinery thus far.

I was going to go deeper into nutritional-supplement lobbying politics, Mormon conspiracies, and weave that all into a larger narrative about the pharmaceutical industry via the modern snake oil Neurontin, but. . .well, maybe the Mormon faith should be off limits, right? Next post will be about Neurontin, "euphoric events", and assessment of drug abuse liability. But I'm afraid that it's Benadryl o'clock. . .