New | 17-year-old girl arrested in Jiangxi after posting photos of herself snorting ketamine online
A 17-year-old girl from China’s Jiangxi province has been detained by police after posting online photos of herself and a group of friends snorting the illegal drug ketamine.
After a popular nightclub in Xinyu, a prefecture-level city of around 1.3 million people, had its business licence suspended for six months as part of a crackdown on drugs and prostitution in the city, a series of photos of young women snorting ketamine and dancing in a private room went viral online.
Ketamine (K fen) is a popular club drug on the mainland, where it is consumed in much the same way as cocaine is in the West, despite the two drugs’ very different effects on users. Originally developed as an anaesthetic, ketamine can cause hallucinations and mild-euphoria when taken at low does, or a dissociative state similar to an out-of-body experience – referred to as a “K-hole” – when consumed in large amounts.
In 2008, the UN wrote that ketamine was “the most abused drug in Hong Kong [and] gaining popularity across southern China,” though it warned that due to its legitimate applications, “the true extent of its use is unclear and probably underestimated.”
Ketamine was the “most abused” psychotropic substance among reported drug users in Hong Kong in 2013, according to the Central Registry of Drug Abuse.