Toops Scoops: The Drug Behind the "Zombie Apocalypse"

In February, when we ran a story about a kooky family-run business that was selling faux zombie insurance, I was fairly certain it was tongue in cheek. Now I'm not so certain — and under the circumstances, the term “tongue in cheek” is making me uneasy.

In case you've been away for awhile, this week a story went viral about a guy in Miami who was shot and killed by police while he was in the act of chewing off a homeless man's face. By any accounts the story is horrific, but the particulars of the case make it especially chilling — especially that after having warning shots fired at him by the cops, the guy looked up, growled, and kept on chewing.

Turns out the assailant was probably high on the synthetic street drug known as “bath salts” at the time of the assault. And that's a story unto itself — because on the face of it, bath salts are technically legal, which it would seem could open up a big can of liability for an unsuspecting purveyor.

Because believe it or not, a highly addictive drug that encompasses all the properties of meth and LSD in many states can be simply bought over the counter at a head shop, convenience store, smoke shops, truck stops or over the Internet.

When news of bath salts first hit the media last year, some people (including me) thought idiots were getting high on the stuff you buy from Bath & Body Works (heck, we tried smoking banana peels in the '70s, too). But the bath salts street drug is actually a combination of synthetic drugs often made from mephedrone and methylenedioxypyrovalerone (MDPV), which are legal. Bath salt dealers get around the law by packaging the drug as actual cosmetic bath salts or as plant food, then labeling it “not for human consumption.”

Unlike cooking meth, it doesn't seem as if formulating bath salts could end up in an explosion, or the long-term pollution of a property where it's made. However, if an unwitting (or witting) store is selling the stuff, I'd think there'd be a huge liability concern. 

As of last November, the drugs used to make bath salts were banned in 31 states. And last year the federal government put a year-long ban on the drugs; that law expired in March.

One thing is clear: bath salts can induce extreme paranoia, make users violent and are highly addictive. They're also supposedly undetectable by drug tests, which could make them attractive to some users.

I'm not sure if the spreading use of this drug will usher in “zombie apocalypse” behavior in users, but if I was an insurance agent placing coverage for convenience stores or smoke shops, it would scare the hell out of me to think they might be selling this stuff — whether it's legal or not.