In the UK, 19% of adults smoke, which is a decrease of 7% from 26% six years ago. However, in the last year, 38% of people in the UK have taken a substance called laughing gas (also known as nitrous oxide or “hippy crack”) according to the Global Drug Survey 2016, which is an increase of 14.3% of 2015’s 23.7%. This means that as smoking is rapidly decreasing, a new replacement is quickly rising to becoming the new “thing” - laughing gas. The seemingly harmless substance was used as an anaesthetic by Humphry Davy in 1799, who used ai as a recreational drug as well as an anaesthetic for patients. When testing it out he described the effects as “sensations similar to no others”. Now, due to modern science and medicine we have not only discovered more effective anaesthetics, but also the horrifying secrets behind consistent, heavy uses of nitrous oxide.
Users are at risk of a condition called peripheral neuropathy, which results from damaged nerves. Breathing in high concentrations of it can quickly reduce the blood’s level of oxygen, and heavy use can deplete the stores of vitamin B12 in the body, leading to anaemia and nerve damage, and repress the formation of white blood cells, and invaluable part of the body’s immune system. People who take it can also be at risk from asphyxiation, strokes, blackouts, seizures and heart attacks. Despite these effects, only 40 deaths have occurred in the last forty years, hut the number has doubled from 2016-2017. Ian Hamilton, a drug researcher at York University stated that “This significant rise in deaths due to nitrous oxide use needs urgent action”
Nitrous oxide comes in small silver canisters, which you may have seen littering the sides of pavements and roads. Despite being relatively harmless in small amounts, if taken repeatedly in large quantities, like smoking, it can be fatal. Therefore, even though smoking is on the decline, there is still many more dangers out there that could become the next big thing, and soon become out of hand.
Eve Tyler, Waldegrave School for Girls
