We first started to talk about the dangers of the synthetic drug known as bath salts last year, but unfortunately, it seems they’ve recently become even more of a buzz drug — more and more headlines are popping up, citing bath salts as the drug of choice for many bizarre criminal stories. Now dubbed “Satan’s Bath Salts” and the “new weapons of mass destruction,” the drug has tons of people talking.

Bath salts are a synthetic substance manufactured using MDPV, or methylenedioxypyrovalerone, plus other substances, created by chemists who make small changes in molecules of existing substances to form new drugs. Bath salts create effects similar to cocaine, meth or LSD, and can cause extreme energy, rapid heart beat, insomnia, chest pain, heart attack and strokes, not to mention hallucinations, psychosis and paranoia, which can lead to violent, erratic behavior.

• Police in Miami are now saying that bath salts were behind the strange and scary May 26, 2012 “zombie man” incident, in which one man ripped off parts of another man’s face before being shot by police, only to continue to chew the man’s face before dying. 
• This week, a copycat of the Miami incident found another Miami man reportedly high on bath salts and drunk on cans of Four Loko tried to bite the hand of an officer as he was being arrested, growling like an animal and telling the cop “I’m going to eat you.”  
• This week, news broke of a man who was sentenced to 27 years in prison after he admitted to being high on bath salts when he burglarized and attacked a Biloxi, MS resident with a knife.
• Today, more news broke about a man in Austin, TX who police claim was high on bath salts when he physically and verbally attacked an EMS worker last Friday after jumping off a bridge into a body of water, swimming to shore and claiming he was the devil.

All of these crazy headlines are like a double-edged sword — on one hand, it’s a good thing to spread awareness about this relatively new, highly dangerous drug. It’s clear people — parents, especially — should know about bath salts and what they can do to the brain and body, since they’re becoming more and more prevalent.

On the other hand, do you think these headlines are just glorifying bath salts, making them enticing and “trendy” for those who may be suffering with a mental illness, and on the brink of committing a crime?