A drug marketed as “pink cocaine” was turning up more often in US nightclubs and drug busts in recent months, alarming health officials because it was usually not cocaine, and no two batches were the same.The potent powder, part of a new wave of polydrugs, was described as a dangerous cocktail commonly containing ketamine and ecstasy, and sometimes mixed with methamphetamine or fentanyl. Officials warned that the unpredictability sharply raised the risk of overdose, Axios reported.Authorities from Los Angeles to Miami in recent months reported busts or issued strong warnings involving pink cocaine, also known as tuci or tusi. In 2025, New York investigators seized pink cocaine along with dozens of guns in a Tren de Aragua-linked trafficking case. US Attorney General Pam Bondi announced in April that DEA agents raided an “underground nightclub” in Colorado Springs, Colo., to arrest undocumented immigrants and seized pink cocaine. A Miami-Dade medical examiner case series described multiple fatalities from September 2020 to July 2024 involving “tusi/pink cocaine”.Tuci had no standard formula and was described as a volatile mix of stimulants, depressants and opioids that could be mixed locally from other drugs and dyes. Lab tests most often found ketamine and ecstasy (MDMA), but samples also contained methamphetamine, cocaine, opioids and fentanyl, with added pink dye.Users’ experiences ranged from euphoria, increased energy and sociability to sensory enhancement and emotional openness. They also reported altered perception, hallucinations or dissociative effects, while other mixes gave users anxiety, paranoia, confusion and strange or disturbing thoughts.Pink cocaine originated in Colombia in the late 2000s and early 2010s as a club and party drug that initially mimicked or contained traces of the psychedelic phenethylamine 2C-B or 2C. It gave rise to a new group of narcos who Latinised the term “2C” and pronounced the new product “tusi” while adding pink dye as a branding strategy, per Vice. The drug since made its way north and Europe.“Tusi is not just being imported as a drug. It’s the importation of an idea,” Joseph J. Palamar, Professor of Population Health at NYU Langone Health, tells Axios. Palamar said tusi did not need to be smuggled as a finished product and that once the concept arrived from Latin America, dealers could recreate it locally using whatever drugs they had access to. The pink dye made the drug “Instagrammable,” said Palamar, because it looked new and exciting despite the risks. “If it weren’t a pink powder, I don’t think it would be this popular.”Poison centres were seeing cases where tuci users believed they were taking a mild psychedelic or stimulant, but instead ingested dangerous combinations that could affect the heart, brain and breathing, Kaitlyn Brown, clinical managing director for America’s Poison Centers, tells Axios. “There is no antidote for pink cocaine. All responders can do is support the patient while the drugs clear their system.” Brown said first responders used naloxone to help patients and provided other care on the scene while authorities remained in contact with their regional poison centres to obtain any new information about the drug.Researchers estimated that 2.7% of New York’s electronic dance music scene-nightclub attendees used tusi in 2024, a snapshot suggesting it was in active circulation in the club world. America’s Poison Centers reported 18 “pink cocaine” exposures across four states since January 2024, with most needing medical treatment.An initial toxicology report revealed that former One Direction singer Liam Payne had pink cocaine in his body when he fell to his death from a balcony in Argentina in 2024. During Sean “Diddy” Combs’ recent federal trial in Manhattan, a former assistant testified that part of his job was procuring and stocking narcotics, including tusi, for parties.Officials said tusi appeared to be making its way to rural America. In Louisiana, local officials in Tangipahoa Paris publicly warned that pink cocaine was being linked to fatal overdoses in the area.
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