Why is 'selling poison instead of drugs' even a logical scare-tactic? Wouldn't even the shadiest of dealers want to keep their customers/hosts/victims around to, you know, keep bleeding money?

And that's why nobody makes fakes or knock-offs, right? Because they'd lose their customer base once their customers purchase the product and find out it is not genuine.

They're are large profit margins to be made off of either cutting drugs (if you're nice, with something inert, if you're not, just with something cheap) or for things like LSD, selling research chemicals that are similar yet different and massively cheaper to manufacture/buy than the real thing.

You failed to connect the logic... selling a 'fake' or knock-off brand != selling poison. I wasn't secretly weighting the pros and cons of buying the no-name Tylenol last time I needed to cure a headache.

"Hmm, do I potentially poison myself for a savings of a couple of bucks? I might die... but it _is_ three bucks..."

>Wouldn't even the shadiest of dealers want to keep their customers/hosts/victims around to, you know, keep bleeding money?

Not really, no.

For example: spike heroin with fentanyl, user dies, other users flock to that dealer who supposedly has extremely high quality heroin.

This tactic doesn't work as much now that the fentanyl epidemic is widespread and known but it certainly happened in the past.

Also, many dealers are addicts themselves. If they run out of money and need more drugs, what's the chances they will sell some bullshit and claim it's something else? What if they get into some other kind of trouble and need fast cash?

> Wouldn't even the shadiest of dealers want to keep their customers/hosts/victims around to, you know, keep bleeding money?

Most illegal drugs are potentially deadly, and some share of users are going to die from them. Even rationally, cutting with cheaper but more toxic material can be justified if the increase in profit per transaction is sufficient to outweigh the reduction in the expected number of transactions per customer.

Of course, also, drug dealers may not always act rationally, and may not even understand the hazards (either in isolation or due to combination with the drug in question) posed by ingredients used to cut drugs.

It's not a logical tactic, just, without professional equipment (whose sale is restricted!) working with drugs whose doses are measured in micrograms is a hard task and likely to result in failure.

Why are the drugs in the illicit marketplace the ones with such small active doses? Prohibition strongly incentivises the manufacture/transport/sale of drugs with higher potency (per unit volume) -- as the odds of detection go up with bulkiness: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_prohibition

I think it's less poison, and more just ensuring a quality product. Dealers can cut drugs with other cheaper ingredients to increase their profits. Having a reputable seller avoids these sorts of shenanigans.

There is currently an epidemic in Vancouver (among other cities) of overdose deaths from a drug called Fentanyl that is several orders of magnitude more potent than morphine. People want it because it is so potent, but the problem with extreme potency is that the difference between an imperceptible difference and a lethal dose is orders of magnitude smaller in terms of weight.

My guess is 'poison' was a slight hyperbole.

Few people actually want fentanyl. Some enjoy the patches, but it doesn't have the same feel as heroin/morphine/etc., though they're close enough to all get you high. It's just super cheap and available, illegally. When the cost of the equivalent dose is a tenth or even a quarter, well that's a huge selling point.

As always with opiates, the real issue is improper manufacturing/labeling. Even IV users would be mostly fine if they had properly labelled IV ampoules.

While I think the just of what you are saying is correct, remember that the fentanyl crisis has been happening for an incredibly long time. These people know what they are buying, and many dealers openly sell fentanyl now. Not to mention that when you talk about the fentanyl crisis you are talking about a very specific subset of people.

Rat poison is a bit extreme but I've seen one dealer crush up anti-histamines to cut with cocaine. He was making a fair bit of money.

Anti-histamines are not poisonous.

Nope but it's still not pleasant. Granted they're still snorting cocaine but do they want to short sedative antihistamines when they want a stimulant? Unlikely.

The point is dealers will cut with unsavoury shit. They're not stupid enough to cut with poison but they are stupid enough to cut with shit that will turn people away.

> Granted they're still snorting cocaine but do they want to short sedative antihistamines when they want a stimulant? Unlikely.

Actually it's not unlikely.. South Dallas has a problem with stuff - cheap heroin cut with Tylenol PM. cheap and common. about $3 a hit.

Heroin is a little bit different than cocaine. Cocaine is a much more social drug so you will see a larger number of non addict customers to addict customers.

Plus emphasis on sedative. Paracetamol has a synergistic effect with opiates. It wouldn't do the opposite of what it's meant to do. It's more like mixing caffeine tabs with heroin.

Heroin cut with Tylenol would be a non-issue to a heroin addict. Heroin is considered dirty to the many people who these dealers serviced (yeah I know). I doubt they served many of any cocaine addicts. Just people with nothing better to do on a Friday looking to have a "good time".

I know they no longer deal because one got run out of town after squandering about a thousand quids worth of the stuff on loan with nothing to show for it.

Dealers sell whatever they get. Users will generally buy whatever the dealers have. Most people don't test their drugs so they don't have any idea or just don't care what they're actually using. For example, some estimates are that >60% of "molly" in the U.S. is really bathsalts or meth.

Because 'dealers' that aren't interested in maintaining a 'going concern' could possibly make a quick buck – a 'killing' – in a market without strong info about seller's reputations.

That's one strategy, if said shady dealer was planning on being around. Cutting the drugs with a cheaper material, even if it's slightly poisonous, helps margins.

I think "poison" here means things more like Fentanyl, which has been recently cut into a lot of different opiates.

See the recent news about fentanyl.

If you never plan on selling to him again, and because you don't actually have anything.