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- No restful sleep: how nootropic drugs are sold under the guise of dietary supplements
No restful sleep: how nootropic drugs are sold under the guise of dietary supplements
The prescription drug Phenibut is being freely sold on the Internet under the guise of a muscle growth supplement, the Anti-Counterfeiting Association told Izvestia. The law allows the nootropic drug for anxiety and stress to be sold only in pharmacies, but in fact it can be bought in sports nutrition sections without any prescription. There it is positioned under the guise of sedative supplements, vitamins, training complexes and relaxants. An overdose of the drug can lead to sleep disorders, increased anxiety, and addiction, doctors say. About what else is dangerous "phenibut" dietary supplements and how he got into free sale - in the material "Izvestia".
How "Phenibut" hit the Internet
"Phenibut", which is prescribed to patients with various forms of anxiety and depressive disorders, can be bought on the Internet without a prescription, told "Izvestia" experts of the project "Do not risk. Check!" project of the Russian association "Antikontrafakt". The editorial board studied the links offered by the experts and was convinced that there is a large assortment of such drugs.
Some of them contain the word "phenibut" right in the name, while others hide its presence in the composition behind a number of authorized substances. For example, "Phenibut Pro 500 mg / Phenibut Pro food concentrate" is sold on one of the marketplaces as "antidepressant, sedative for adults without a prescription, phenybut amino acid, stress pills".
The type of product is a sedative dietary supplement that "improves sleep, increases productivity, creative thinking, ability to solve complex problems, and speed of information assimilation." The sellers of the product do not hide the fact that "Phenibut Pro" "is a nootropic", but add that it "is not a medicinal product". On marketplaces, 60 pieces of this product of 400 mg can be bought at a price of just over Br3 thousand, while in pharmacies it costs from Br114 to Br 1 .3 thousand for 20 tablets. In pharmacies it is sold in the section "nootropic drugs", when ordering online, the mark "by prescription" is displayed.
In sports nutrition stores "Fenibut" is sold under the signboard "dietary supplements, goodies and everything for PP" (proper nutrition. - Ed.). Some cards are labeled "bestseller". Here the description of the drug is adapted to the needs of athletes - such a dietary supplement "improves well-being, enhances regeneration when used before bedtime, provides a boost of energy for the whole day, eliminates the negative effects of stress, increases the production of growth hormone and muscle growth, fights catabolism, promotes faster fat burning...". 100 tablets of 500 and 900 mg can be bought at a price from 4 thousand to 8.8 thousand rubles.
For muscles and libido
"Izvestia" found more than a dozen dietary supplements, where "Phenibut" is not specified in the product card and is not contained in its name. Such a drug is sold in the category of "booster with nootropic effect" or "relaxant", and "Phenibut" can be found in its composition only on the back of the package. These products are also sold as "pre-sleep complexes" or "anabolics".
For example, in "Epic Labs Night Dream Predsonics" (60 tablets) for 1890 rubles, "Phenibut" is present in a dosage of 430 mg. But you can find out about this, either by already buying the drug, or by carefully studying the photos presented in the product card. There on the back of the package in small print you can see "Phenibut" in the composition with other sedatives: passiflora, valerian root and melatonin.
Another "pre-sleep complex for a powerful testosterone and growth hormone boost during sleep" - Revange Anabolic Dreams 90 caps - contains about a dozen "top ingredients to boost anabolic processes, sleep quality, performance and sex life during wakefulness." Among them is Phenibut. The drug costs 7 thousand rubles. One of the users in the comments laments that the price does not allow him to drink this "wonderful mix" all year round.
In most of the preparations disguised as dietary supplements "Fenibut" is contained in a clinically acceptable dosage of 150 to 450 mg. But there are packages with horse doses of the drug, totaling up to 4000 mg per day. This is despite the fact that the standard, i.e. prescribed by a doctor doses of the drug are a maximum of 750-1500 mg per day, told "Izvestia" head physician of the clinic "Dependence 24", psychiatrist-drug addict Alexey Kazantsev
- 4000 mg per day - this is a very large dosage, it threatens sleep disturbance and increased anxiety, that is, the effects opposite to those stated, - said the narcologist. - Also, if taken uncontrollably and in large doses, Fenibut can cause addiction.
The drug, added the doctor, does not affect the growth of muscle mass and can not affect. This is affected by growth hormones, anabolic steroids, testosterone.
In addition, as follows from open sources, "Phenibut" reacts positively to doping samples. Detection of even small amounts of the drug in an athlete will be considered as an anti-doping violation.
Where the pills come from
In the United States, "Phenibut" is not registered as a drug, which allows companies to produce and sell it under the guise of dietary supp lements - including outside the country.
- This is how imported "Phenibut" disguised as a supplement gets to the Russian market, where it is most often distributed in the category of "Sports Nutrition", hiding from the supervision of regulatory authorities, - explained the head of the project "Do not risk. Check!" Sergey Zelenets. - Our specialists, together with experts from the international association "Anti-Counterfeiting" have not found any preparations with "Phenibut" from Russian manufacturers on free sale without a prescription. All "supplements" with this medicinal substance enter online stores from abroad.
Free sale of "Phenibut" in Russia is prohibited, but sellers circumvent this law by placing it in the sections of sports nutrition under the guise of sedative supplements, vitamins, training complexes and relaxants, explained "Izvestia" expert on countering the spread of counterfeit and falsified products Alexander Nosenko.
- Drugs with the direct name "Phenibut" or its indication in the product card are usually on the marketplaces' stop-list, - the expert noted. - Therefore, this name is not added to the description, and the drug itself is declared as a "post-workout sleep aid".
What marketplaces say
The site prohibits the sale of dietary supplements without registration, all goods in the category of dietary supplements get on sale only after manual verification of documents, said "Izvestia" in the press service of Ozon.
- This is the marking code, if the goods are imported into Russia after October 1, 2023, and if after - a certificate of state registration. The sale of dietary supplements without SGR is prohibited. The site also prohibits the sale of any food products that contain substances from the list of prohibited substances for the category of dietary supplements. This measure will help to protect buyers from products that could potentially be dangerous, - noted there.
Wildberries in 2022 conducted a full integration with the state register of dietary supplements and vitamin complexes of the Eurasian Economic Commission and has already blocked more than 3.5 thousand product cards due to the lack of SGR in them. Consumers can check the number of SGR in the product card in the "Characteristics and Description" section, they said.
- Wildberries regularly monitors product cards and blocks those that are presented in any other category except dietary supplements," the marketplace added. - When creating a product card, the seller undertakes not to place it in a category that does not correspond to the product; these rules are enshrined in the offer.
Online marketplaces try to promptly remove goods that do not comply with the law and block unscrupulous sellers, but this is not always enough, said Baisolt Khamzatov, first vice president of the international association "Anti-Counterfeiting" in a conversation with Izvestia.
- Now a bill "On Platform Economy" is being developed, which should strengthen the regulation of Internet trade," he said. - Secondly, it is necessary to strengthen cooperation with public organizations. This will allow to create mechanisms of control over goods, to form a space of trust for citizens. We are currently working on such a project with the largest marketplaces.
"Izvestia sent product cards with Phenibut to Rospotrebnadzor, which said that they did not have SGR and were not listed in the register. And Roszdravnadzor told Izvestia that they intend to work with Roskomnadzor to block the described drugs.
