BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) – A multi-agency statewide bust cleared more than 30,000 illegal vape pens, pods, and juices. It also put six different businesses on the hot seat with a permit suspension.
In all, $1 million worth of illegal vape and smoke shop products are off the street, says Louisiana’s Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control commissioner Ernest Legier.
“We have had to secure an additional 10 off-site storage units to house all of the illegal material that we are collecting,” said Legier. “Not just with vapes but CBD and THC products.”
One of the more dangerous items seized, tianeptine, known to the FDA as “gas station heroin.” In a recent post to social media, FDA Commissioner Martin Makary, M.D., said it’s becoming an issue.
“It is not approved by the FDA for any use,” highlighted Dr. Makary. “Despite this, some companies are illegally marketing and selling these products, making some concerning and unproven health claims.”
Some companies are saying this supplement can improve brain function, treat anxiety, or even reduce pain. However, according to AP News, over the past few years, calls to poison control over the substance have skyrocketed. And side effects like confusion, nausea, and death are grabbing people’s attention.
“They can say off-label for this and that, but we know exactly what’s going on,” said Dalton Enloe, an employee with Woodland Addiction and Recovery Center. “You know, a relapse for somebody in recovery can mean death.”
Enloe has firsthand experience dealing with addiction. He says it can be hard for people struggling with addiction to not give in to urges, especially when these products are right in front of them at a checkout counter.
“It’s just too much sometimes for folks who may not be strong enough to walk in and say no to that kind of stuff,” Enloe added. He says products containing tianeptine have been frequently abused in patients who end up helping in the recovery process.
“The first thing we’ll ask them is what happened, what went wrong out there,” said Enloe. “A lot of the time they’ll say well I started messing with this gas station crap first and that led to other things.” A store in Central off Wax Road was one of six statewide that had been issued a permit suspension by the ATC. In total, 10 arrests were made across the state.
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