They allegedly forced him to reveal his formula and expelled him from the trade for good. According to a 2012 article by Revista Semana, Alejo started out refining and selling tusi in Medellin, but ran afoul of the city’s hegemonic crime group, the Oficina de Envigado. In the late 2000s, it reached Colombia’s nightclubs, courtesy of rich youngsters in Medellin who had small quantities smuggled from Europe by post, according to an article by El Colombiano. They sold it within their upper-class social circles, mostly as the whitish powder or small pill that 2C-B still comes as today. These designer drugs created both the euphoria of MDMA and the visual distortions of LSD.
According to the Colombian drug checking organisation Échele Cabeza, 95 per cent of drugs sold as 2C-B (also known as Nexus and culturally embedded enough to be enshrined in multiple reggaeton song titles) were fake by 2018. Worryingly, the cache of fillers included potentially far more harmful substances like the long-lasting amphetamine PMA, the cathinone MPDV, and even Sildenafil – better known by its brand name of Viagra. The street drug primarily consists of ketamine, an anesthetic that has some hallucinogenic effects, but may contain other stimulants, opioids and benzodiazepines, medicines used to treat anxiety because they slow down the nervous system. Over the past 5 years, tusi has experienced a resurgence, especially in South and Central American club environments. Each manufacturer or street dealer can craft their blend with varying proportions of ketamine and amphetamines.
The unregulated and often unknown composition of Tuci amplifies these risks, making each use potentially life-threatening. Factors including drug tolerance, physical stature, how much is used (and frequency), as well as what is in tusi can influence these harmful effects. Aside from the “happy high” that tusi provides, the downsides include confusion, stomach sickness, hallucinations, changes in breathing, a drop in body temperature, feeling agitated, or even seizures. Long-term use can also cause changes in your brain and permanent impairment of blood vessels. Cardiac arrests have also been reported, primarily caused by “excited delirium.”
How Does The Drug Make Users Feel?
Synthetic drugs have long wreaked havoc on communities worldwide, and “Tuci” or “Tusi,” also known as “Pink Cocaine,” is the latest substance to surge in the market. Originating in Colombia, Tusi became a hot topic of conversation after the drug was mentioned in Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones Jr.’s lawsuit against Sean “Diddy” Combs. Jones made shocking allegations in court documents, including accusing Diddy of hosting wild, drug-fueled parties where sexual assaults took place. Opioids have been involved in most overdoses in the U.S. over the past several years. These include heroin, morphine, prescription opioids and synthetic opioids like fentanyl. While you may wish that your loved one not use opioids at all, if they do, here are some harm reduction strategies for opioid use that you can share with them to reduce their risk of illness and death.
Effects
- While not containing traditional cocaine, pink cocaine, also called tusi, tusibi, or tuci, is often a mix of ketamine, methamphetamine, molly, and opioids.
- Pink cocaine is largely found at parties and club scenes, particularly in Latin America and Thailand, where the UNODC reports that ketamine-based drugs are highly popular.
- While there, the teen drank a Red Bull that was spiked with tusi, resulting in their death.
- The tusi phenomenon also has the potential to complicate drug research as unknown exposure to drugs like ketamine and MDMA will lead to underreporting of use.
- Josh Torrance is a criminology tutor and drugs policy researcher at the University of Bristol.
Several men were said to have held up the family-owned business at gunpoint, beating two women who worked at the location and dragging them by their hair. It’s believed the same gang is also a major player in trafficking tusi into the U.S. Law enforcement officials also claim that the drug is moving quickly underground through clubs and concerts. 2C-B powder can look unappealing and is notoriously painful to snort, so some early vendor began mixing their powder with an aromatic pink food coloring.
Tailored towards high-income customers, it wholesaled for up to $43,000 per kilogram, about 33 times more than the equivalent $1300 brick of cocaine. In 2010, a low-level criminal named alias “Alejo” arrived in Bogota. Alejo was one of the first tusi “refiners,” those retailers who dyed 2C-B pink and drowned it with other synthetics in artisanal drug kitchens.
Policy, News & Research
Pink cocaine is largely found at parties and club scenes, particularly in Latin America and Thailand, where the UNODC reports that ketamine-based drugs are highly popular. Pink cocaine, also called “tusi,” (the pronunciation of “2C”) is pink, but it has little, if any, cocaine in it. As with many synthetic drugs, it can cause psychological and physical dependence.
- Worryingly, the cache of fillers included potentially far more harmful substances like the long-lasting amphetamine PMA, the cathinone MPDV, and even Sildenafil – better known by its brand name of Viagra.
- The pink look quickly caught on, causing demand to rapidly increase.
- Users might feel an overwhelming urge to keep using tuci for its euphoric effects due to its MDMA content, spiked with speed, which puts the user on alert at the same time.
- After the pandemic it was a new trend in Spain and expanded to clubbers.
- Tusi emerged as a novel substance in 2022, with its rise potentially linked to the circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Those “new psychoactive substances” mentioned, or NPS, have also puzzled authorities. WebMD reports that NPS drugs are challenging to test because their chemical makeup differs. Because of the nickname “Pink Cocaine,” some have simply believed the drug is a food-coloring version of the typically white drug. However, researchers say tusi may not be cocaine at all, but it will definitely be a combination of some of the most popular and dangerous street drugs. “Certainly, any customer would assume that there would be cocaine in something marketed as ‘pink cocaine,'” New York City Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan said, per Newsweek.
“The person who thinks they’re getting cocaine and ends up getting a pretty strong dose of ketamine may be completely knocked out,” Brennan said. Brennan added that “the primary concern is for the users,” especially considering the drug isn’t consistent in its makeup. Tusi contains both depressants and stimulants, shocking one’s system and causing a series of potentially deadly effects. “Cocaine is a stimulant, and someone who is expecting to toosy drug get cocaine may know how it affects their body or their tolerance,” said Brennan of the “speedball” concoction. “Ketamine is something completely different. It’s an anesthetic, a sedative and it has hallucinogenic properties as well.” As of mid-2022, besides Colombia, tusi is popular in the Southern Cone countries of Chile, Argentina and Uruguay, as well as Spain and Panama.
About Tootsie
Having taken over the country’s growing tusi trade from a captured Urdinola boss, investigators believed he was Colombia’s largest distributor of synthetic drugs. Machos-refined tusi was now selling in Bogota, Medellin and Cali, as well as Cartagena and Barranquilla. However, for such a widespread substance there was considerable disagreement about what it actually was. In Panama, a police spokesman said tusi was ketamine cut with the pharmaceutical opioid tramadol. In Uruguay, the Interior Minister suggested it was a mixture of cocaine, methamphetamine, and LSD.
Consumers in turn began to ask their dealers for tusi tailored to their personal preferences, notes Quintero. They phone the supplier and say, ‘look, I want a more downer tusi,’ or one that is more stimulating or even a psychedelic one,” he told InSight Crime. He learnt his lesson the third time, moving to Bogota with the protection of a crime boss named alias “Máquina.” Tusi’s reputation had by now reached the Colombian capital and Alejo was soon dealing five to eight kilograms a week.
Pink Cocaine Composition: What’s Really Inside? (Ketamine, MDMA, Fentanyl & More)
Those with limited experience in acquiring street drugs could create pink cocaine from readily available products. The term tusi itself does not have a specific meaning in standard Spanish; it is an everyday term used in the drug trade and among users. The composition of Tucibi can vary greatly, making it a potentially unpredictable and dangerous substance, as it may include a variety of other high-risk substances such as cathinones, opioids, and benzodiazepines. The pink look quickly caught on, causing demand to rapidly increase.
-B Drug Facts: Separating it from Dangerous Pink Cocaine (Tusi)
The brand has somewhat evolved with the appearance of tusi in other colours, including green and yellow. However, its consumption in Colombia – and possibly across the region – is thought to still be increasing. But in March 2012, Máquina was arrested and, having lost his criminal protector, Alejo was kidnapped by the Urdinolas, a notorious Cali crime family.
After the pandemic it was a new trend in Spain and expanded to clubbers. It was a drug with the new colour that made it very attractive,” she tells me from their Barcelona office. The synthetic hallucinogen – often pegged as a cross between MDMA and LSD – was first synthesised by the research chemist Alexander “Sasha” Shulgin in 1974. According to a report in Insight Crime, it became the narcotic weapon of choice for Medellín’s clubbing cognoscenti by the late-2000s, where enterprising vendors dyed the notoriously painful-to-snort 2C-B with pink food dye.