Following advice from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD), the Home Office has moved to ban a range of designer sedatives including etizolam, which has gained wide popularity for self-medication of anxiety and the compound U-47700, an opioid which has frightened US media and displayed issues of chemical damage to tissues of very heavy users. You can see our test results for U-47700 here and here.

The ACMD’s role is to perform detailed research into issues relating to drugs for the UK government so that it can make informed decisions about drug policy. On 20 December 2016 it published two of its typically detailed overviews, one dedicated to U-47700 and one on the novel benzodiazepines. These detail various aspects of the drugs usage and distribution patterns and the research allow the ACMD to make recommendations on scheduling.

Although the novel substance market has been all but wiped out by the Psychoactive Substances Act, (which renders anything “psychoactive” illegal to sell or import) Police Scotland has reported that etizolam is being sold as “valium” by street dealers. Benzodiazepines may be used to self medicate anxiety disorders, or recreationally for relaxation and carry significant risk of addiction and dependence, with withdrawals for heavy users potentially being severe enough to be fatal. Police Scotland also reported that there had been an increase in deaths involving etizolam and an 8x increase in people found driving under the influence of the drug since 2015.

The Home Office decided to move directly to full scheduling instead of temporary scheduling as recommended by the ACMD, and on 3rd May 2017, the full legislation was published, to be enforced from 31st May 2017.

This means that etizolam is illegal in the UK as a class C drug with up to 2 years for possession, and U-47700 is illegal in the UK as a Class A drug with up to 7 years for possession.

In a change from constructing a time consuming “blanket ban”, the ACMD also recommended scheduling a long list of other compounds in the same class by their specific names, listed below:

Common Name Classification Chemical name Adinazolam Illegal (UK Class C) 1-(8-Chloro-6-phenyl-4H-[1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4]benzodiazepin-1-yl)-N,N-dimethylmethanamine Bromazolam Illegal (UK Class C) 8-bromo-1-methyl-6-phenyl-4H-[1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4]benzodiazepine 4’-Chlorodiazepam Illegal (UK Class C) 7-Chloro-5-(4-chlorophenyl)-1-methyl-1,3-dihydro-2H-1,4-benzodiazepin-2-one Clonazolam Illegal (UK Class C) 6-(2-Chlorophenyl)-1-methyl-8-nitro-4H-[1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4] benzodiazepine Deschloroetizolam Illegal (UK Class C) 2-Ethyl-9-methyl-4-phenyl-6H-thieno[3,2-f][1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4] diazepine Diclazepam Illegal (UK Class C) 7-Chloro-5-(2-chlorophenyl)-1-methyl-1,3-dihydro-2H-1,4-benzodiazepin-2-one Etizolam Illegal (UK Class C) 4-(2-Chlorophenyl)-2-ethyl-9-methyl-6H-thieno[3,2-f][1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4]diazepine Flubromazepam Illegal (UK Class C) 7-Bromo-5-(2-fluorophenyl)-1,3-dihydro-2H-1,4-benzodiazepin-2-one Flubromazolam Illegal (UK Class C) 8-Bromo-6-(2-fluorophenyl)-1-methyl-4H-[1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4] benzodiazepine Fonazepam Illegal (UK Class C) 5-(2-Fluorophenyl)-7-nitro-1,3-dihydro-2H-1,4-benzodiazepin-2-one 3-Hydroxyphenazepam Illegal (UK Class C) 7-Bromo-5-(2-chlorophenyl)-3-hydroxy-1,3-dihydro-2H-1,4-benzodiazepin-2-one Meclonazepam Illegal (UK Class C) 5-(2-Chlorophenyl)-3-methyl-7-nitro-1,3-dihydro-2H-1,4-benzodiazepin-2-one Metizolam Illegal (UK Class C) 4-(2-Chlorophenyl)-2-ethyl-6H-thieno[3,2-f][1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4]diazepine Nifoxipam Illegal (UK Class C) 5-(2-Fluorophenyl)-3-hydroxy-7-nitro-1,3-dihydro-2H-1,4-benzodiazepin-2-one Nitrazolam Illegal (UK Class C) 1-Methyl-8-nitro-6-phenyl-4H-[1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4]benzodiazepine Pyrazolam Illegal (UK Class C) 8-Bromo-1-methyl-6-(2-pyridinyl)-4H-[1,2,4]triazolo[4,3-a][1,4]benzodiazepine U-47700 Illegal (UK Class A) 3,4-dichloro-N-[2-(dimethylamino)cyclohexyl]-N-methylbenzamide

If you do use U-47700 then you can buy tests to help detect mis-selling in our shop. The most suitable setup is the MDMA & Cocaine Testing multipack.