On Dec. 12, a 38-year-old man and a 21-year-old woman were arrested in Shiga Prefecture for allegedly kidnapping a female high school student who was later found dead, due to a drug overdose, at the man's apartment.
The two suspects told police that they became acquainted with the student through social media channels for people interested in taking excessive amounts of medication in an effort to reduce mental suffering.
In recent years, the problem of young people abusing over-the-counter drugs, such as cough and cold medicines, has become more serious.
With some products that are readily available at drugstores containing stimulants and presenting the risk of addiction, experts are sounding the alarm.
Escaping from worries
“I wanted to stop feeling lonely and escape my worries about the future,” said a 19-year-old high school student in Kyushu, as she described her first experience of recreational drug use in late November.
The student, who grew up being psychologically abused by her mother, now lives alone.
On that day, she took 28 cough medicine tablets over a four-hour period from late afternoon into the evening.
First she took 12 — three times the recommended dosage — then an hour later she took eight more tablets, before taking another eight later on.
She said she felt relaxed and foggy. “It was good because I didn’t have to think about anything while I was under the influence,” she said.
The student, who went to school the next day, said she bought the medicine online.
What prompted her to take the excessive dose were Twitter posts about cough medicine inducing euphoria.
“I can’t drink alcohol because I’m a minor and I will get arrested if I use illegal stimulant drugs,” she said. “I thought taking too much of a (over-the-counter) drug wouldn’t be a problem.”
Even though she has told a school nurse at her high school about the experience, she is worried she might do it again.
A survey by the health ministry’s research team found that across all age groups, 53.5% of drug-related patients — the largest percentage — suffered due to abusing stimulants. But among the 39 patients with ages between 10 and 19, taking excessive doses of over-the-counter drugs made up the largest percentage, at 56.4%, with that proportion continuing to rise from no cases in 2014.
The survey was conducted in September and October 2020 on 2,733 patients with drug-related problems at 232 psychiatric medical care facilities.
Addictive cough medicine
According to Toshihiko Matsumoto, 54, director of the National Institute of Mental Health’s Department of Drug Dependence Research and head of the research team, many such drug abuse cases involve cough medicine that contains dl-methylephedrine hydrochloride or dihydrocodeine phosphate.
Although they won’t cause problems if taken appropriately, methylephedrine causes stimulation of the nervous system and is used as a raw material for stimulants. Dihydrocodeine is an ingredient in narcotics.
Both compounds exert a direct stimulant effect on the central nervous system and are highly addictive.
It is difficult to break the addictions, and people who quit the drugs experience withdrawal symptoms such as feeling unmotivated, washed out or depressed. Misuse of the drugs also causes damage to the internal organs and can seriously harm one’s health.
The health ministry designates medicines that contain any of the six pharmaceutical ingredients including methylephedrine and dihydrocodeine as drugs with risks of abuse.
Drugstores are obliged in principle to sell only one box of such drugs per person at a time, and to ask anyone wishing to buy multiple boxes for a reason. They are also required to confirm the name and the age of buyers if they are young.
However, it is easier for people to purchase such drugs anonymously online. Furthermore, social media is flooded with posts by people who engage in misuse of over-the-counter drugs, offering information for young people on which can be taken legally.
Matsumoto is calling on young people abusing drugs to consult friends and adults they can trust in order to reduce mental suffering. He says people around them should not try to force them to stop, since that will only make matters worse.
Instead, those people should listen seriously to the problems those misusing drugs are facing, build a relationship that allows a frank exchange of opinions and then advise them to see a psychiatrist.
There are cough and cold medicines that do not contain methylephedrine or dihydrocodeine. “Drugmakers should consider replacing (drugs that contain such ingredients) wherever possible,” Matsumoto said. “It is also necessary to take measures such as prohibiting online sales of medicines that may be abused and reducing their quantity per unit.”
This section features topics and issues from the Chubu region covered by the Chunichi Shimbun. The original article was published Dec. 21.
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