Nice Guy drug is not very nice at all - editorial

• Published date: 12 October 2021
• Author: JPOST EDITORIAL
• Publication title: Jerusalem Post, The: Web Edition Articles (Israel)

The warning came after a 31-year-old man from Haifa died and 39 people were hospitalized having taken a particularly lethal version of the drug. According to a joint statement from the ministry and police, the drug had been laced with a poisonous substance – apparently rat poison – and a number of those taken to Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa suffered from severe internal bleeding.

Mr. Nice Guy is "particularly dangerous because it is mixed with different substances including [other] drugs, poisonous materials, and pesticides, which change from distributor to distributor," the statement said.

Following the death of the 31-year-old, two men aged 27 and 31 from Kiryat Motzkin and Haifa were detained for allegedly distributing the drug, and are likely to be charged with manslaughter.

A young man who had used the drug, his face twitching with anxiety, urged parents watching the Channel 12 News on Saturday night to ensure that their children do not take Mr. Nice Guy, which he warned was "poison."

Israel banned Mr. Nice Guy and other synthetic cannabinoids, which had become popular among young people in Tel Aviv and elsewhere, in 2011. In 2013, the Knesset passed legislation titled "The Struggle Against the Phenomenon of the Use of Dangerous Substances Law," which seeks to solve the problem of the time interval between a psychoactive substance's entry to the market and the declaration of the substance as a dangerous drug under the Dangerous Drugs Ordinance.

According to the Health Ministry, kiosk-sold drugs (samei pitzutziot in Hebrew) is a colloquial term that refers to a broad range of dangerous substances presented by vendors as "drug substitutes" and intended to cause a sensation of "getting high."

These substances are sold in the form of tablets, solutions for inhalation and drinking, incense and blends for smoking, also using a narghile, the ministry says. Kiosk-sold drugs are presented as innocent and harmless, with misleading labels such as "100% legal," "100% natural," and "Not under the Drugs Ordinance!" appearing on the packaging. "In fact, these are drugs in the full sense of the word and they have a damaging and addictive effect, sometimes irreversibly," the ministry stresses.

According to the ministry, teens and young adults are the main consumers of "kiosk-sold drugs" and...