BEAUMONT — There hasn’t been an increase, but synthetic marijuana overdoses in the Beaumont area have stayed surprisingly consistent.
“This is something that cheap, it’s easy to get for just about anybody, and you pass a drug test with it,” said Kim Arrington with the Woodlands Recovery Centers in Beaumont. “Those are the three biggest reasons anyone would ever use it.”
Arrington isn’t surprised that people still use the drug after a spike in overdoses in 2016.
“(There was) a lady that was stuck in a hallucination directly as a result of synthetic weed, and she thought she was an airplane,” said Arrington. “She thought she herself was an airplane and they had to strap her down because she was trying to fly out of the window.”
Over the past 6 months, Beaumont Fire and Rescue and Beaumont EMS dealt with 332 Drug Overdose calls. In that same time period EMS had 164 calls for psychiatric behavior. Many of which were later determined to be drug overdose. Initially it can be hard to determine if the overdose it related to synthetic marijuana, but Jon Clingaman with Acadian says they see many cases in Jefferson and Orange Counties.
“I would say over the last 5 years it’s escalated tremendously,” said Clingaman.
Another problem that law enforcement and first responders are seeing is that the drug ever changing. According to law enforcement officials and Arringtion, dealers are now mixing this drug with other more dangerous drugs, such as fentanyl or PCP. A sometimes deadly combination.
So warn if you have teenagers in your home, warn them of the possible effects of this drug.