Drugs and Alcohol (young people)

Mephedrone

What is mephedrone?
Mephedrone (also known as M-cat, Meow-meow, Plant Food) is a stimulant from a family of drugs related to amphetamines (such as speed and ecstasy). It can come in the form of powder, tablets and capsules .It's a relatively new drug that was made illegal in 2010. It has become increasingly popular as an alternative to other illegal drugs such as ecstasy or cocaine.

Andi thinks that mephedrone may be already replacing ecstasy in popularity and all the college students we talked to had heard about it. Lauren said that it is the drug that people her age are most likely to be offered in bars or clubs. When sold over the internet, it was often described as a 'plant food', 'research chemicals' or 'bath salts', and 'not for human consumption'.

Daniel only heard about mephedrone recently when friends were trying to buy it over the internet. He wasn’t impressed.

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Sex: Male

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Well I’d heard about this whole plant food one

Six months ago. I was with two friends who like, they take drugs. They’re not addicts. They do it socially and it’s fine but I was sat talking to them and they were talking about this plant food that they get off the Internet and that was like, oh thank fuck I don’t do all of that anymore. I mean do you realise how fucking retarded you sound talking about ordering plant food off the Internet for fun. I mean it’s just sounds really stupid. I don’t know. I’m not really interested in what it’s like but

What are the effects of mephedrone?
Similar to ecstasy, Mephedrone can make people elated, alert, chatty and have feelings of empathy. Alex used mephedrone once and said that he didn’t notice any significant change in his mood. He described the experience as a ‘short energy boost’ and feels that maybe the effects of mephedrone were distorted by the alcohol he was drinking at the same time.

What are the negative effects of mephedrone?
Mephedrone can cause anxiety and paranoia. Physically it risks over stimulating the heart, circulation and the nervous system which could cause fits. None of the young people we spoke to had experienced any of these negative effects though.

Mary Ann has used mephedrone and described it as a ‘horrible’ drug.

On one occasion Mary Ann experimented with mephedrone and hallucinated. She would never use it again. (Played by an actress)

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Age at interview: 20

Sex: Female

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Same as mephedrone, that new drug that’s outthat is lethal that drug is, that is the, you don’t start coming down off it and this is how come you can carry on seshing on it because you don’t start to feel tired or nothing, well obviously you do but it’s not like Cocaine, you kind of come, you rather come down on it at some point, with this Mephedrone you, but you can be up on all night on it and you, you don’t start to come down until like the next night so, but then you’re taking more because you’re still awake and you want more of the buzz, but you, the buzz kind of wears off but you’re wide awake, you cannot sleep, wide awake, I’ve never done nothing like it.

This is mephedrone?

Yeah I hallucinated on it, I thought everyone’s face was jelly, I would never touch it again, it was horrible, never ever, ever, ever

Okay.

horrible.

Last reviewed July 2018.
Last updated: January 2015.