Identifying New/Emerging Psychoactive Substances at the Time of COVID-19; a Web-Based Approach
ORIGINAL RESEARCH published: 09 February 2021 doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2020.632405 Identifying New/Emerging Psychoactive Substances at the Time of COVID-19; A Web-Based Approach Valeria Catalani 1*, Davide Arillotta 1, John Martin Corkery 1, Amira Guirguis 1,2, Alessandro Vento 3,4,5 and Fabrizio Schifano 1 1 Psychopharmacology, Drug Misuse & Novel Psychoactive Substances Research Unit, School of Life & Medical Sciences, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, United Kingdom, 2 Swansea University Medical School, Institute of Life Sciences 2, Swansea University, Swansea, United Kingdom, 3 Department of Mental Health, ASL Roma 2, Rome, Italy, 4 Addictions’ Observatory (ODDPSS), Rome, Italy, 5 Department of Psychology, Guglielmo Marconi University, Rome, Italy COVID-19-related disruptions of people and goods’ circulation can affect drug markets, especially for new psychoactive substances (NPSs). Drug shortages could cause a change in available NPS, with the introduction of new, unknown, substances. The aims of the current research were to use a web crawler, NPSfinder®, to identify and categorize emerging NPS discussed on a range of drug enthusiasts/psychonauts’ websites/fora at the time of the pandemic; social media for these identified NPS were screened as Edited by: well. The NPSfinder® was used here to automatically scan 24/7 a list of psychonaut Ornella Corazza, University of Hertfordshire, websites and NPS online resources. The NPSs identified in the time frame between United Kingdom January and August 2020 were searched in both the European Monitoring Center Reviewed by: for Drugs and Drug Addictions (EMCDDA)/United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime Simona Zaami, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy (UNODC) databases and on social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Laura Hondebrink, and YouTube) as well, with a content qualitative analysis having been carried out on University Medical Center reddit.com.
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