New Data Reveals The Potency Of Australian Illicit Drugs

The second batch of results from the CanTEST health and drug checking service in the ACT has revealed some interesting results over the potency of Australia's drugs.

The CanTEST Health and Drug Checking Service is operated by Directions Health Services and CAHMA with technical assistance from Pill Testing Australia. The drug checking aims to be a drug harm reduction service that analyses the contents of drugs to educate users on the potentially dangerous substances in illicit drugs.

The results from September show that Ketamine was expected in 14 samples and was only detected in 6. The purity of the drug ranged between 65-75%. Where ketamine wasn't found, 4 samples contained a psychoactive substance titled 2'-fluoro-2-oxo-PCE which is an emerging research chemical with unknown effects.

In the 34 samples of MDMA 30 actually featured MDMA. Their purity range was large with 5/6 capsules containing 36-78%, 10/12 powders contained 5-82%, 9/9 pills contained <5-23% and 6/7 crystalline contained 20-81%. 2 Of the pills contained caffeine and 1 of the pills contained both caffeine and methamphetamine. 

Cocaine was expected in 14 samples and was detected in 13. The sample which contained no cocaine was found to contain methamphetamine. Three heroine samples were also tested with no fentanyls being identified. The same goes for methamphetamine, with three of the three samples detecting the drug with purities ranging from 60-69%.

25 samples were tested for the presence of fentanyl and all returned negative results.