Dealing in drugs is a very serious criminal offence that will send those found guilty for a very long stay at Corradino, all bills paid by the state through the seizure of all of the criminal’s assets. However, people like MARIO MIFSUD are paid to deal with drugs. BERNARD BUSUTTIL caught up with the manager of the forensic laboratory whose test tubes are filled with substances criminals would kill for.



Mario Mifsud’s office at the Malta National Laboratory is a marvel of sorts. A picture of the late Pope John Paul II looks down on his desk, from under which he produces official-looking sealed envelopes containing sachets of heroin, bagfuls of ecstasy and a water bottle full of used syringes.

A heroin sachet, he said, costs between e20 and e25 with each one containing some 0.7grammes. Its weight varies according to demand and supply. The heavier the sachet, the higher the supply of heroin in the market, said the pharmacist as he describes how he keeps an eye on the local heroin market by weighing sachets seized by the police.

When the market is weak, he explains, dealers may start cutting heroin, that is, adding other substances to it in order to maximise weight. However, he said, this does not make much business sense for dealers as users can feel the difference and just change their supplier.

Mr Mifsud turns his attention to a plastic two-litre bottle containing tens of used syringes. We thank God that whoever used the syringes had the good sense of disposing of them in a bottle other than dumping them individually. He speaks about a recent experience in the Czech Republic where a national entity is responsible for the collection of used syringes from places used for drug abuse, something which is unheard of in Malta, said Mr Mifsud.

What about cocaine?

Currently, cocaine is more often than not consumed as crack, that is, cocaine is dissolved in a solution of sodium bicarbonate and water and boiled. A solid substance is separated from the boiling mixture which is then smoked in a water pipe. This way of taking cocaine is seen as a very sociable way of abusing the drug.

Sniffing, on the other hand, is carried out widely during parties as people sniff their cocaine in toilets. There is another rising trend whereby people take ecstasy and sniff cocaine in order to keep them going throughout the night without tiring, as both drugs are stimulants.

Consuming cocaine as crack is the most addictive form of cocaine, and it is one of the most addictive forms of any drug, yet people tend to prefer the first method as sniffing leaves visible irritation marks beneath the nostrils.

Although Mr Mifsud displays a deep knowledge on a wide variety of drugs, he is a specialist in ecstasy, a substance which has to be better defined at law, he says.

He started off in the field as a lab technician at the Police Forensic Lab in 1981 and used to be a scene of crime officer together with Dr Anthony Abela Medici. At the time, the laboratory was situated at the Chemistry Department of the University of Malta.

He became a pharmacist in 1988 and five years later the laboratory was relocated to the Police Headquarters from the university.

In 1994, Mr Mifsud won a Chevening scholarship to King’s College London where he obtained a Masters Degree in Forensic Science. He is now reading for a doctorate on the effects of ecstasy on clubbers from the same university at the Institute of Psychiatry at Maudsley Hospital.

He explains how 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), colloquially known as ecstasy, started out as a recreational drug to induce in a diverse range of user types a general feeling of empathy and goodwill towards all mankind. Hence, the term “entactogen” has been coined in an attempt to convey the essence of this experience. At one time, he said, there was fear that MDMA might surpass alcohol as it was more successful in making people feel good together.

Mr Mifsud recalled the first time MDMA was found in Malta, “it was 1995 and we panicked” he remembers. He still keeps a photo of the first MDMA pill he saw, which was sent abroad for information purposes.

Since then, the dosage in each pill was reduced drastically; in fact, there have not been any reports of death due to ecstasy overdose. In fact, people are able to swallow more drugs. The reason is, he said, that those who make money out of drugs cannot afford to cause a stir by selling out drugs that are instant killers. He explains that the only way drugs are featured in the news is after an overdose or after a drug haul is made public.

He reported how the UK government recently rejected a proposal by the chairman of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs to declassify ecstasy as it was not scientifically proven that it was as dangerous as cocaine and heroin. The UK government opposed the suggestion because there was not enough information exonerating the drug from causing permanent damage to the brain. Research on the effects MDMA (ecstasy) tablets had was not without its problems and misinformation about its effects was published by famous scientists. In 2002 Dr George Ricaurte and his colleagues from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore published a paper claiming that people taking MDMA for just one night might later develop Parkinson’s disease. This paper had to be retracted after a labelling error was discovered on bottles during the study. It was claimed that the bottle thought to contain MDMA contained in fact methamphetamine.

Mr Mifsud adds that addiction to MDMA is not what one would expect from heroin or cocaine addiction. He explains in very simple terms that MDMA replaces a substance called serotonin, which is produced naturally by the brain to make us feel good. MDMA causes the release of enormous amounts of serotonin and in addition blocks its reuptake. Hence, MDMA users will feel good, euphoric and uninhibited. In the long run, the serotonin will be removed and it would take up to two weeks for the brain to replenish the serotonin. When the effect is over users take MDMA in the hope of feeling good but what happens is that more serotonin is destroyed. In reality, users enter into a vicious circle as they try in vain to feel good by increasing the dose while suffering mood depression due to low doses of serotonin.

He describes how these effects are clearly explained on the internet, on forums which discuss drug use and various other issues.

Mr Mifsud outlined the difference in which the government is advised on drugs: while the British advisory council on the Misuse of Drugs also includes forensic scientists, the Maltese one lacks forensic scientists and toxicologists. He called for toxicologists to be introduced in the commission, as well as forensic scientists that deal with drug analysis as it makes more sense for the commission to hear what scientists were finding out.

I asked whether there are policemen who are trained scientists and Mr Mifsud promptly answers that he would not be employed had there been such policemen. He pointed out that the first time that meta-chlorophenylpiperazine (mCPP) was introduced in Malta, in 2006, the police were not aware of the difference, which was similar to the judiciary.

Since then, he said, the system has realised that ecstasy was after all a street name and it started to be more specific in arraignments, trials and appeals.

He is of the opinion that Maltese law regulating drugs has to change, “our laws reflect a bygone era, we are in 2009, thus we need our laws to evolve.” Mr Mifsud said that field research in order to truly assess the drug problem in Malta was a sine qua non for government to take informed decisions in the field. “This should start as soon as possible if we truly want to curb the alarmingly growing drug problem and it should be continuous.”

“I’d rather have a scientific report slammed in parliament on account of MPs’ opinion rather than not having anything over which MPs can debate,” he said as he called for an increase in research, both on and off the field.

Problems have arisen in certain fields, such as establishing whether a person has trafficked in drugs or shared his drugs with someone else or how to tackle poly drug use, which is becoming increasingly widespread. Drug users, he said, through mixing with people some research and sharing their information, have learnt how to maximise their pleasure by using different drugs. Furthermore, energy drinks rich in caffeine and alcohol abuse should be considered in this equation, as one might maximise the dangers of the abused drugs as is the case when one takes cocaine with alcohol.

Thus, a drug user might drink alcohol mixed with energy drinks, then take cocaine and ecstasy and then smoke cannabis to calm down on his way home, ending up taking a list of drugs rather than simply cocaine. This does not include prescription drugs to maximise the effects of MDMA, which Mr Mifsud said he did not come across locally. However, he is aware of an increased mix of MDMA with Viagra, which is known in the streets as “sextacy”.

Mr Mifsud referred to a project carried out in Austria, which has a large problem with ecstasy and decided to tackle the problem on a harm reduction basis as seems to be the case in Malta.

Prof. Reiner Schmid, 11 years ago decided to tackle the problem of death brought about by taking ecstasy which had a killer substance in it. He built a mobile laboratory which he installs at party sites and called his project ChEck iT! Clubbers who are about to consume ecstasy are encouraged to take their pills to be analysed for dangerous substances and an announcement is made if a particular type of pill is shown to be life threatening. The project is financed by the Austrian government, and the police have agreed not to arrest people when they approach the testing place.

In doing so, Prof. Schmid gained the trust of clubbers and used it to illustrate the adverse effects of drugs while building a veritable database of illicit substances in real time.

In other instances, the UK, and now also the Czech Republic have started offering courses in addiction at masters or even at doctorate level as they are realising that addiction is a disease.

Some eight years ago, Briton John Ramsey came up with another idea, that of Amnesty Bins, whereby clubbers are encouraged to leave their illicit substances in bins on entering a club against a promise of amnesty. These are then taken away for scientists to work on.

Incidentally, said Mr Mifsud, he contacted Dr Ramsey when Di(beta-phenylisopropyl)amine (DPIA) was first discovered in Malta in 2006.

There have been a number of important hauls in Malta, said Mr Mifsud, which helped track new drugs, such as the DPIA and Benzylpiperazine (BZP). He also mentions one of the largest ever finds of mcPP – 50,000 tablets found in 2006. At the time the drug was unregulated.

As we part, Mr Mifsud stresses once again that efficient anti-drug laws have to be based on informed decisions and research on the field.