Ketamine 'epidemic' among youth raises alarm

The first time Barney Casserly used ketamine at a UK music festival he thought he had found "nirvana." Five years later he died in agony, leaving behind devastated parents and friends.

- Agence France-Presse

LONDON:

"I would never, ever have imagined that this would happen to us as a family," said his mother, Deborah Casserly, still grieving for Barney who died in April 2018, aged 21.

Ketamine, an affordable recreational drug that induces a sense of detachment from reality, has reached unprecedented levels of popularity among young people in the UK, with some experts even calling it an "epidemic."

The extent of the crisis prompted the government in January to seek advice from an official advisory body on whether to reclassify ketamine as a Class A substance. That would bring it in line with other drugs such as heroin, cocaine and ecstasy, meaning supplying ketamine could carry terms of up to life imprisonment.