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50DESIGNER DRUGSSamantha Reid. 1984–1999. “Samantha left for themovies on Jan. 16, 1999, with two of her girlfriendsand two male friends from high school. GHB and/orGBL was slipped into her Mountain Dew soft drinkthat night. Samantha was taken to the hospital withno vital signs and died after 18 hours on life support.The boys from high school are now serving 5 1/2 to15 years in prison for the manslaughter death ofSamantha.” (www.ghbkills.com)ARE THERE MEDICAL USES FOR GHB?One of the ironic things about many abused drugs is that theyoften have a medicinal value and can actually be used to treatvarious diseases and disorders, given the proper medicalsupervision. However, the risks of abuse and overdose makethem poor treatment options.One peculiar effect of GHB is that it seems to reducethe symptoms of narcolepsy, a relatively rare sleep disorder.People with narcolepsy are excessively sleepy all the timeand often have a condition called cataplexy, in which theperson can suddenly and unexpectedly lose all muscletone and fall immediately into rapid eye movement (REM)sleep (the stage of sleep during which dreaming occurs).Thus, a person with narcolepsy can immediately go frombeing awake right into REM sleep. (Normally, it takes atleast 60 minutes to enter into REM after falling asleep.)These rapid transitions from waking to REM sleep canresult in frightening hallucinations. Interestingly, boutsof cataplexy are usually brought on by laughter or strongemotional experiences.In clinical studies, GHB has been shown to effectivelyreduce the symptoms of narcolepsy. These findings are quite