No hangovers, no illicit purchases, and a guaranteed “high” for a few euros. Eight years ago, Côme discovered nitrous oxide during an evening of his engineering preparation. The principle is simple: by inhaling small capsules of this gas, initially used in medicine as an analgesic or in the kitchen to make whipped cream, the students are overcome with uncontrollable laughter and an immediate feeling of well-being. Very quickly, its use becomes commonplace in the evenings to which the apprentice designer goes. “I remember that everyone liked it. We put on specific music: in the chorus, we all inhaled our capsule at the same time. Some didn’t react, others laughed, others fell to the ground…”, says the young man, now 27 years old. He himself began to buy directly from medical students, or via online sales sites like Amazon. “I bought in packs of 25, between 50 and 100 cartridges for an evening. But instead of using it in the kitchen, we breathed it in balloons, it was a school delirium, “he explains. he, assuring that he had completely stopped his consumption since the end of his studies.
In a few years, the small silver capsules and the colored balloons have, for their part, more than prospered. According a study of the Smerep student mutual, nitrous oxide even ranked third among the drugs most consumed by students at the end of 2018: 6% of them had already inhaled it, compared to 20% for cannabis and 7 % for poppers. “Everyone takes it. It has become normal,” says Juliette*, a 19-year-old medical student. For a year, the young woman has even participated in group orders between girlfriends, buying gas in batches of 500 or 600 capsules on a site specializing in kitchen accessories. “A batch of 360 doses is 119 euros,” she says, now preferring to inhale “about fifteen capsules per evening” rather than drinking alcohol. Faced with exponential consumer demand, the “proto” is no longer sold only under the coat between students or on specific pastry sites. “We use a classic site, but I know that you can also have it delivered on Snapchat, for example,” says Juliette.
“Deluxe” editions and deliveries on Snapchat
On this instant messaging application, dozens of accounts displaying balloon emojis offer to deliver, everywhere in France, laughing gas capsules or balloons for a few euros. “No more need to travel to make your party crazier!”, For example, promises one of these accounts with a lot of colorful slogans, whose delivery people are “available from 6 p.m. to 3 a.m.” on weekdays and from “6 p.m. to 5 a.m. the weekend” in Montpellier. While a law enacted on June 1, 2021 aimed at “preventing the dangerous uses of nitrous oxide” notably established the prohibition of selling or offering this product to minors, whatever its packaging, in all shops, public places and on the Internet – under penalty a fine of 3750 euros -, any Internet user can thus obtain supplies via a reseller on social networks, without any verification of their identity or age. “It’s like for hash, cocaine, or even sanitary passes at the time of the Covid: as soon as there is a strong demand, or a legal difficulty in obtaining a product, you will find resellers on social networks to take advantage of it. And in ten minutes on Instagram, Snapchat, Whatsapp or Telegram, you can have almost everything you are looking for delivered to your home, “explains to L’Express Yann Bastière, national delegate SGP Unit Police.
On various Internet sites, which have specialized in the resale of nitrous oxide, the marketing goes even further. Carboys of all colors, which can be purchased in whole pallets, are thus sold to consumers as “exceptional products”, under increasingly sought-after names: “Gold” edition whose purity would have been tested at “99.9%”, “Midnight” edition for “long summer nights, for night owls, for unforgettable moments until sunrise”, “Maxxi 20000” for two-kilo canisters.. On some platforms, the sale of “proto” even comes in several accessories, ranging from the bag allowing you to “carry your charger in any setting or event” to bottles of blueberry, banana or strawberry flavorings for ” balloons with delicious flavors”. So many promises far from targeting cooks specializing in Chantilly cream, therefore. “But this iconography and this professional marketing are destructive, because they seduce young people already conquered by the playful and festive vision of the product”, regrets Dr Guillaume Gzrych, metabolic biochemist at the Lille University Hospital and founder of a care sector specialized for victims of nitrous oxide in the Hauts-de-France region.
Since he became interested in the subject, the doctor has seen everything, or almost. “We found cylinders on which the QR code of the retailer’s Snapchat messaging is downright inlaid, to recommend them directly. We have some that certify that the gas is indeed halal or vegan, others with colored straps to carry them , still others who reach six kilos …”, he despairs. While on the networks, laughing gas is becoming more and more commonplace. “You have reality TV stars or footballers who take videos of themselves inhaling balloons, or teenagers who challenge themselves to ‘make balloons’ in the car, during a break or in front of the college exit” , relates Dr. Gzrych, who recalls the “extremely serious” consequences of taking this product for health. “It can range from simple tremors and loss of consciousness to paralysis of certain limbs, orientation disorders or thrombosis. And in Hauts-de-France, reports of serious cases have quadrupled in three years”. According a study of ANSES and ANSM published in November 2021, no less than 388 cases of nitrous oxide poisoning have also been reported to the poison control centers (CAP) and to the centers for assessment and information on the pharmaco-dependence addictovigilance (CEIP-A) in 2020 – against only 93 cases in 2019.
Organized traffic and international network
Yet the impact on public health does not appear to limit traffic or chill dealers – quite the contrary. On the Internet, some sites even offer customers the opportunity to buy “wholesale” large quantities of nitrous oxide – count for example 609.99 euros for 24 canisters of 615 grams – often shipped from abroad. “The explosion in demand has recently led to a professionalization of traffickers: nitrous oxide is now at the heart of organized trafficking, and an international network is developing”, indicates the information service and of communication of the police (Sicop) to L’Express. In recent months, the authorities have also recorded “a number of armed robberies”, aimed at stealing cartridges and nitrous oxide cylinders. “We closely monitor this traffic, even if it remains very difficult to establish a typical profile of resellers. Generally, the cylinders are found in the context of other cases, such as an armed robbery or a routine check. ”
On August 7, the arrest of a scooter driver carrying six bottles of laughing gas for refusing to comply led to the seizure, a few days later, of fifteen tonnes of nitrous oxide in the Paris region. According to the Nanterre prosecutor’s office, “a Dutch delivery driver” came to deliver dozens of pallets of carboys, representing several tons of product, to a box in Collégien (Seine-et-Marne). Last January, seven tonnes of “proto” were also seized in Seine-et-Marne, while more than 1,500 canisters were discovered a few weeks later in a disused car park in the Bourgogne district, in Tourcoing (Hauts-de- France). “We are faced with an organized network, whose structure is similar to that of drug trafficking networks, for a product whose use, initially legal, is totally diverted”, estimates Eric Denoeud, deputy mayor of Tourcoing in charge of prevention and access to rights. “But the main difficulty in this type of case is that nitrous oxide remains a legal product: it remains very difficult to condemn users or possible resellers. We do what we can on the basis already existing laws and decrees of the town hall”.
Faced with this legal void, local elected officials or the various prosecutors are indeed trying to adapt. The city of Tourcoing, for example, issued an order in July 2021 aimed at purely and simply prohibiting the sale of cartridges containing nitrous oxide in all businesses in the territory of the municipality, for minors as well as for adults. The Nanterre public prosecutor’s office has chosen to pursue the trafficking of this gas as “trafficking in poisonous substances”: as provided for by the public health code, resellers could thus be sentenced to a fine of up to 375,000 euros and five years’ imprisonment. In Bobigny (Seine-Saint-Denis), the prosecution is trying to prosecute the suspects based on the notion of hidden work. “We have laid the foundations and defined a first framework to regulate the consumption of nitrous oxide, but it is still far from being sufficient”, estimates for her part Valérie Létard, senator from the North at the origin of the proposal. of law adopted on June 1, 2021. “We are currently considering a new version of this law, which would in particular make it possible to condemn the sellers and the misuse of the product, by getting as close as possible to the legislation which regulates narcotics” , she told L’Express. “In view of the explosion in consumption and the extent of traffic, it has become necessary”.