They are called NHL, Couche- Tarde, Coca-Cola and Toyota.
But they aren't just the names of well-known companies - they are the popular names of illegal pills being popped all over the province.
Health Canada and the Surete du Quebec held a joint press conference today to release the details of a new study on drug use in Quebec. Their goal : to make the public more aware of the pitfalls of illicit drugs.
Officials analyzed 365 samples of pills seized between June 2007 and July 2008 by police in Montreal, Laval and Longueuil. 54 per cent of the pills tested did not contain what they were supposed to. Even worse, there were dangerous often lethal combinations of the substances . Health Canada says 80 percent of the ecstasy pills being sold out on the street today are mixed with other chemicals.
"People — they just don't know what they are taking," said Benoit Archambeault, manager of Health Canada’s drug analysis service. "For ecstasy consumers, for example, about 80 per cent of people buying ecstasy aren't getting ecstasy — they're getting something else."
Two pills which look identical can contain wildly different concentrations of the same substance - or even different substances.
That means a pill taken at the beginning of an evening might only contain a weak dose of an active substance, while a second pill taken later might contain a very powerful dose.
Not surprising says McGill professor Joe Schwarz. "These drug labs are obviously not regulated. You are at the mercy of the people developing these pills."
What's more the profile of people using the drugs is changing.
"People between between the ages of 15 and 40 are using these drugs more and more. We're finding them in schools, in bars, they're not just at rave parties anymore." said Sgt. Suzanne De Larochelière, a drug specialist with Surete du Quebec.
Community organizers say there's nothing new about the popularity of the designer pills. They say the only way to protect drug users is testing the contents of pills. "It's already being done in France and Switzerland." said Jean-Francois Mary of Cactus, a downtown needle exchange centre. "Here in Canada we can't provide the service because it's illegal for us to come into contact with the drugs."
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