Substance abuse

Substance abuse
Psychoactive plants and substances are dealt with by the law in two opposite ways:
Legal and often taxed: alcohol, nicotine.
Illegal and possession and use often prosecuted: cocaine, heroin, LSD, cannabis, methamphetamines (yaba, ice, ecstasy, molly).

While the death sentence for drug dealers or users seems not to deter others, at least that is a 100% sure way that person will not deal or use drugs again.

But I digress, the subject of this post is the science and not legality of abuse for recreational purposes of substances that are legally sold for legitimate purposes .

Here a list of substance abuse I have come across in Thailand

Glue sniffing (toluene)
Glue sniffing is wide spread among the poor, and when walking the slums I often see discarded tins from glue or the plastic bags with dried remains. Sometimes I can smell glue sniffers from meters away, or hours after.

Highly detrimental to body and brain, and those who started in childhood have a look in their eyes and behavior that I call  
"the lights are on, but nobody is home”.

Further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inhalant

However I can see the allure, and one of the perks of working (long ago) in a chemical laboratory is to occasionally sniff solvents under the guise of “olfactory identity test”. My favorites are THF, di-isopropyl ether, MTBE, isopropanol, and a whiff of pyridine. But I digress.

Betel nut and leaf (arecoline) หมากสง ใบพลู
Widespread in Myanmar. In Thailand, I witnessed it only a few times with older people in the provinces. Betel nut however is still widely sold for donations for religious purposes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areca_catechu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areca_nut
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betel

Update 9apr2019: to my surprise, betel is still common in Taiwan. I noticed only now on my fourth trip, but once alerted, I see stalls selling them, empty bags with label on the sidewalk, and red spots on road. 

Kratom (Mitragyna speciosa) กระท่อม
No personal observations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitragyna_speciosa
The curse and cure of kratom Bangkok Post Spectrum 6/09/2015 http://www.bangkokpost.com/print/681964/
http://cen.acs.org/articles/94/i36/DEA-ban-puts-damper-research.html

Hydroxyzine and Cetirizine in cough syrup
(Hydroxyzine is partially converted into Cetirizine in the body.)
An encounter in 2013: https://christianpfc.blogspot.com/2013/09/park-at-bts-sathorn-saturday-21092013.html
Among seven, they were sharing (as far as I could see):
Coke 1.5 l with ice,
Ceza syrup 60 ml (each 5 ml contains Cetirizine hydrochloride 5 mg),
Tramadol HCl 50 mg (about 10 capsules)

And another encounter in Apr 2016 in Sribampen (Unirax, contains 10mg hydroxyzine in 5 ml).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroxyzine
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cetirizine
Language note: Hydroxyzine is the only word in the English language to have, in order, x, y, and z.

Tramadol
An encounter in 2013: https://christianpfc.blogspot.com/2013/09/park-at-bts-sathorn-saturday-21092013.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tramadol
http://bangkok.coconuts.co/2016/12/22/thai-teens-tramadol-painkillers-restricted-new-abuse-trend-emerges-among-teens

Promethazine
โปรโคดิล (procodyl® syrup)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promethazine
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purple_drank

Poppers (lower aliphatic nitrites)
Poppers is occasionally sold in gay saunas, or offered during orgies. I remember one orgy in R3 sauna (now closed) where staff went around with a bottle as if it was unicorn tears.

While fresh poppers has a smell that I find pleasant, decomposed poppers smells vile (fusel oil and lower aliphatic aldehydes)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poppers
http://www.gaythailand.com/forums/topic/9634-buying-poppers-from-anonymous-grindr-profile/

Laughing gas (dinitrogen monoxide)
Was openly sold on Walking Street around 2013, but then banned.
http://christianpfc.blogspot.de/2015/02/free-entertainment-on-walking-street.html
But on Khao San Road, I saw it on 17mar2017. From McDonald’s (a friend's idea, and I didn't consume anything there, only kept him company while he had a meal) I saw the backstage of their operation. One steel cartridge about 5 cm long and 1 cm diameter is inserted into a foamer for whipped cream and fills one balloon with estimated 2-3 liter volume, which is sold for 100 THB.

Where and at what price are these cartridges sold? I checked in Makro Ladprao and didn't see any.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recreational_use_of_nitrous_oxide

Mosquito coil
I once read or heard somewhere that those on the very bottom of the food chain smoke mosquito coils to get high, but didn’t find anything to support this on the internet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosquito_coil

Various other substances
Not psychoactive, but in developed countries medicine like ciprofloxacin, prozac, valium and viagra are only available on prescription, whereas in Thailand they are sold over the counter.
   
Update, see here as well: https://sawatdeenetwork.com/v4/showthread.php?23463-Boys-and-Drugs

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