Following the changes, lists of prohibited substances are to become an appendix to a regulation issued by the Minister of Health rather than to an act. This is intended to facilitate their updating and, as a result, speed up the outlawing of further legal highs. Their definition will also change so that manufacturers of dangerous substances cannot easily evade the regulations through minor changes to their composition and a new name.
The new regulations introduce an obligation to report to the State Sanitary Inspection cases of poisoning with a substitute substance or a new psychoactive substance. By the end of March each year, the Chief Sanitary Inspector will be required to prepare a report summarizing notifications from across Poland, while facilities suspecting that a patient is using legal highs will have to notify the district sanitary inspector.
The act also provides for the creation of a register of deaths and poisonings caused by legal highs.
The regulations also provide for equal support for people addicted to legal highs and drugs alike—they will be able to receive treatment, rehabilitation and psychological support.
Experts point out that legal highs are not only a problem affecting young people. Adults are increasingly becoming victims. Based on observations of the symptoms with which people poisoned by legal highs are admitted to hospitals, toxicologists suspect that substances with highly dangerous effects have appeared on the illegal market, causing, among other things, prolonged symptoms of respiratory failure.
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