KEY POINTS:
London Underground owner and party pill maker Chris Chase describes calls for the industry to be regulated "noble" but economically unrealistic.
If party pills had to meet the high standards of pharmaceutical medicines, employing scientists and doctors, companies like his could not afford to put the product out, he said.
"I think there would be much easier businesses to get involved in if I had to go through all that."
Mr Chase's position puts him at odds with Matt Bowden, a party pill supplier and head of the industry's Social Tonics Association, who has said he wants them regulated like medicines.
New pharmaceuticals for the New Zealand market have to pass through four stages of clinical trials, starting with fatal-dose animal testing. Getting from the "promising molecule" stage to market can take up to 15 years.
Asked why his marketing material said the next-generation Neuro Blast and Head Candy pills had a herbal formula, when they really had the synthetic compound diphenyl prolinol, Mr Chase said, "I've got no idea".
Mr Chase said the Neuro Blast and Head Candy pills were tested "overseas", but he would not detail where or how.
Last Saturday, the Weekend Herald reported on the experience of a man who tested some unidentified non-BZP pills for London Underground and was admitted to hospital when he became almost unable to breathe and went numb and his blood pressure almost doubled.
Mr Chase dismissed the man as a "hypochondriac", saying he either received a placebo or a caffeine-based pill.
Mr Chase, a stripper before making some of the first party pills and starting London Underground, said the imminent BZP ban and now the controversy over the "next-generation" pills designed to get round the ban made him want to get of the business. "There's no point."
He said the "entire infrastructure" and the media were against party pills.
"They've got so many agencies to get you if they want to - police, Ministry of Health - then there's food and medicine laws. You can't fight the Government, mate."
Mr Chase said the Government had been "creative" in catching out Neuro Blast and Head Candy by saying they were analogues of a class-C5 drug, which he said "is like saying it's of the same illegality as a prescribed cough medicine".
Mr Chase said he had withdrawn the pills containing diphenyl prolinol from sale, but would seek a court ruling on whether they really were a controlled drug analogue as police suggested.
He would not sell diphenyl prolinol if he won the case, but just wanted to clarify the analogue laws that said a substance had to be "substantially similar".
"We want to set a precedent. It will either open it up or close it up," he said.
Mr Chase said he did not drink or do drugs and had stopped taking party pills, but believed they would always have a place in society.
Legal cat and mouse ahead over pills
For every banned psychoactive substance, there are dozens more to come.
Dr Keith Bedford, forensics programme manager for the Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR), said "there is really no way of knowing" how many substances party pill makers could use.
Dr Bedford said the diphenyl prolinol controversy was the start of "a game of cat and mouse" between authorities and party pill makers.
The imminent ban on BZP would make the core party pill ingredient illegal, but it will not diminish demand from users.
Dr Bedford said the creation of new substances would thrust the 20-year-old analogue provisions in the Misuse of Drugs Act into a new light.
Dr Bedford said a substance "substantially similar" to the dozens listed could be defined an analogue - although he added the law has never really been tested.
Although the ESR believed the diphenyl prolinol in London Underground's Neuro Blast and Head Candy pills was an analogue, a court could find otherwise.
This would put it in a "no-man's-land" where they could be distributed freely until legislation was changed.
Dr Bedford also said there could be substances that could not be captured by analogue laws or defined as harmful enough to be classified as a drug, which could also go into the grey area.
He said skilled chemists were obviously working to find the compounds.
"Of the millions of substances out there, finding something like diphenyl prolinol, would be a bit like hunting for a needle in the haystack.
"Somebody with a degree of scientific training, with a bit of nous and an understanding of pharmacology or of medicine, would have brought this to attention."
Dr Bedford said the "cat and mouse" would continue as long as there was a loophole in the law that meant party pill makers did not have to prove their product was safe before it went to market, as medicines and foods have to do.
Dr Bedford said New Zealand was not alone in having difficulty finding the right way to deal with party pills.
"It is a challenge that is not going to go away."
Two views: What's in Euro Blast and Head Candy party pills
London Underground:
A herbal blend called D.O.M.S, named after the four main active herbs.
No materials of a synthetic nature that can be regulated at the drop of a hat.
(source: pill packet; www.londonunderground.co.nz)
ESR:
A synthetic substance called diphenyl prolinol, an "analogue" of controlled drug pipradrol.
Other substances that cannot be confirmed.
(source: Weekend Herald-commissioned study)
