Paper and Fire

“The body lay slumped on the jail floor, curled around a metal toilet. Investigators found no evidence of homicide, just a few scraps of rolled-up paper, singed and scattered on the floor like scorched confetti. For months, inmates had been falling ill at the Cook County jail in Chicago. Officials said they had heard rumors that extremely toxic drugs were infiltrating the facility, delivered on something so ordinary that it seemed impossible to stop … The paper itself must be the culprit — and it was deadly.” NYT (Gift Article): No Pills or Needles, Just Paper: How Deadly Drugs Are Changing. And what’s happening in jails is likely coming to a street corner near you. “The unbridled rise of synthetic drugs is as profound for the illicit drug market as the television was for the radio, or the computer for the typewriter, scientists say, and it is confounding law enforcement officials the world over. ‘This is the modern drug epidemic: It’s like nothing that’s happened in the world before — anywhere.'”