It’s popular with adolescents, provides a marijuana-like high, is available online and on Colorado store shelves, and it’s legal — for now.

As Spice and other synthetic cannabinoids show increasingly public impacts — at Colorado poison control, among probationers and teen addicts, and recently at the Air Force Academy — law enforcers are looking for ways to nip demand for the drug in the bud.

Colorado authorities say they suspect increased use of Spice, plant material sprayed with THC-like chemicals, though that spike also coincides with the first tests available to screen for the tough-to-track substance.

Ban in the works

With no quality-control standards on the drug, some samples have tested 100 times more potent than marijuana, and the worst side effects have been more severe, said Tamar Wilson, staff attorney with the Colorado District Attorneys’ Council.

Her group wants to outlaw any form of synthetic cannabinoid and is pushing a bill to make penalties for possession even harsher than those for marijuana. A bill has not yet been filed in Colorado but is already drawing bipartisan support.

“People are going to emergency rooms because of Spice,” Wilson said. “This is not a marijuana substitute, though that may be why people initially try it. Young people are getting it and bringing it to schools. We realized it really is a significant problem.”

Should the planned legislation pass, Colorado would join 11 other states that ban synthetic cannabinoids.

So-called designer drugs such as Spice — also known as K2 and other brand names — by nature are tough to track.

They are created in laboratories to produce effects similar to more traditional drugs but remain different enough on a molecular level to escape detection in urine tests.

And because chemists can tinker with those chemical formulas, such drugs can also be tough to ban.

The federal Drug Enforcement Administration in November gave notice that it would move to reclassify five popular chemical varieties of Spice as controlled substances.

Producers now advertise new versions of the drug that skirt the compounds on the DEA’s target list.

“Folks that are manufacturing designer drugs, they’re in it to make money,” said Mike Turner, a DEA spokesman. “It’s possible they could tweak a molecule or whatever. We would just act on those as those come about.”

Origins in Europe

Toxicologists studying the Spice phenomenon say the marijuana alternative got its start in Europe, became popular and migrated to the United States a few years ago.

Synthetic cannabinoids are sold as “herbal incense” and labeled, almost with a wink, as “not for human consumption.”

Spice has been attractive to teens and young adults, who think it is safe because it is legal.

YouTube is awash in videos of young people testing Spice and lauding its benefits. And at $25 for 3 ounces, for sale on even mainstream sites such as Amazon .com, it is easily accessible.

A number of hospitalizations linked to Spice have been reported across the country, with users reporting dangerously high heart rates and seizures in some instances.

In Colorado, Spice-related calls to the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center went from two in 2009 to more than 30 in 2010.

Five cadets since last April have washed out of the Air Force Academy near Colorado Springs for using the substance, which is a violation of Academy rules, and 25 more are under investigation.

“It’s cultural. They’re in that age range where using new designer exotic drugs is part of their lifestyle,” said Laurence Freedom, founder of the Freedom Center drug- treatment facility in Lakewood.

The lure of an undetectable high undermines treatment because it has allowed probationers to continue problem behaviors, said Shane Bahr, who oversees the state’s drug courts.

“It goes back to the treatment element,” Bahr said. “It’s the behavior we’re trying to address.”

About six months ago, the lab that conducts drug tests for state courts developed a screening for some forms of Spice.

But at about $35 a pop, drug courts can’t routinely test every probationer, Bahr said.

Boulder County’s intensive-treatment drug court tests more regularly, but it’s still too soon to measure the trend, said Harry McCrystal, treatment-court coordinator.

“Not much is known yet about these substances and how they affect people,” McCrystal said. “A significant number of sanctions have been handed out recently because of Spice.”

Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com