How ‘pink cocaine’ – the drug that killed Liam Payne – is taking a grip in Ireland

Gardai also discovered an estimated €180,000 in cannabis herb and MDMA tablets believed to be worth €7,650 in that operation in Dublin 12, but it was the pink cocaine that stood out.

While cannabis and MDMA, as well as heroin and “regular” cocaine are often swooped up in drug busts here, ‘pink cocaine’ is less well known.

Its effects are also perhaps less obvious, until the high-profile death of Payne, who fell to his death from a hotel balcony in Argentina’s capital, Buenos Aires.

An initial toxicology report revealed that the former One Direction star had reportedly taken a mixture of drugs, referred to as “pink cocaine” before his death.

The name is often used to describe a synthetic mixture of drugs that can be found in powder or pill form, and is recognisable for its vibrant pink colour that is artificially added to make it more appealing.

However, it typically does not actually include cocaine, with the three most common substances being MDMA, ketamine and 2C-B.

MDMA, or ecstasy, is a common party drug with stimulant and minor psychedelic properties. Ketamine is a powerful anesthetic with dissociative, sedative and hallucinogenic effects.

While 2C-B is a less commonly known substance, it is a potent psychedelic drug with hallucinogenic and stimulant effects.

This dangerous drug cocktail has been linked to a growing number of drug-related deaths in recent years.

In January of this year, the HSE raised the issue of the potency of synthetic drugs as presentations at mental health services increased year-on-year.

It said this is partly due to the increased use of cocaine but was also due to the potency of other substances available, with the arrival of synthetic cannabis on the Irish market causing particular concern.

As well as synthetic cannabis, some of the drug issues that arose at Electric Picnic last year, based on findings from festival-goers at the medical tent, involved high dose cocaine and the anesthetic drug, ketamine.

New drugs that emerged at the festival included fluromethamphetimine or 2-FMA which was found there for the first time.

Professor Eamon Keenan, the HSE National Clinical Lead for Addiction Services, said this was being sold as “pink cocaine” but was not cocaine at all, something that the people taking it were not necessarily aware of.

“Don’t be listening to people who say, ‘this is great, I took it and everything is wonderful’, because we certainly saw a huge number of presentations,” he told RTE.

Nicki Killeen, HSE Emerging Drug Trends Project Manager also spoke about drug trends of concern that were emerging in Ireland.

“At three events over the last two years, the HSE has identified seven drugs which have not yet been identified in Ireland before,” she said.

“Our lab analysis has provided valuable information on the potency levels of drugs and new drug trends such as pink powder being sold as Tuci.”

Over the summer of 2023, the HSE found Tuci to contain the new psychoactive substance 2-Fluoromethamphetamine (2-FMA) and ketamine.

Other pink powders were found to contain MDMA, cocaine and benzocaine and MDMA and ketamine mixtures.

According to a study published last year in the American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse, the anesthetic ketamine appears to be the active ingredient most commonly found in “pink cocaine” which had been popular in Latin America and Thailand dating back to the 1970s.

The drug resurfaced in its modern form in Colombia around 2010 and quickly spread to Europe.

A UN update paper warned that high doses of ketamine used outside a medical context can cause cardiovascular and respiratory toxicity effects.

Other adverse effects such as bladder problems, anxiety, panic attacks, palpitations, tachycardia, chest pains, depression, aggravated symptoms of existing mental health issues, slurred speech and the inability to speak.

Bridget Brennan, the special narcotics prosecutor for New York, said because pink cocaine is mixed with illegal narcotics, it can be difficult to determine how the drug cocktail may affect any one person taking it.

“To begin with, you don’t know what the substance is, but secondly, people don’t all react the same way to any drugs,” she told NBC News. “This stuff is not manufactured under pharmaceutical conditions, there’s no certainty to it. It’s a crapshoot any time you take any street drugs.”

Chilling details of the emergency calls a Buenos Aires hotel manager made requesting “urgent” assistance ahead of singer Liam Payne’s tragic death following a 40-foot balcony fall later emerged

Hotel Casa Sur’s head of reception made two calls, telling a 911 operator in the first call: “We have a guest who’s off his head on drugs and is destroying everything in his room. We need someone to come.”

He phoned back after the line went dead, repeating his request to the female responder for the equivalent of the UK’s 999 service, and claiming: “I don’t know if the guest’s life is in danger.

“The room has a balcony and we are afraid he might do something.”

Seconds later the hotel employee, who identified himself only by his first name of Esteban, added: “Just send an ambulance, only an ambulance.”

Brennan said pink cocaine can be “very dangerous” because it is typically a mix of depressants and stimulants.

“I think the most dangerous aspect of it, is that you typically see stimulants, which might be methamphetamine or cocaine, mixed with other substances like ketamine that are sedating, meaning they have the opposite effect on the body,” she said. “If you have a drug that’s telling your heart to speed up and another drug that’s telling your heart to slow down, that’s a problem.”

In an interview with NBC News in August, Brennan warned that people “absolutely cannot trust that your dealer is selling you a product that you asked for.”

“The drug market now is more dangerous than I’ve ever seen it,” she said after pink cocaine — commonly used in the club and party scenes — was mentioned in a lawsuit against music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs.