You can snort, but you can’t hide anymore … Police will soon be able to test people for cocaine and possibly other drugs via their fingerprints within seconds — and washing your hands won’t help.
There’s a new forensic test developed by scientists in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. Maybe the entire concept sounds crazy to you, but they say the test is 99 % accurate and even washing your hands does not prevent detection.
After taking the cocaine, people produce two different chemicals as they metabolise the drug and these substances are present in their sweat, and this paper spray mass spectrometry technique uses a special type of paper that can detects these chemicals.
Dr Melanie Bailey of Surrey University said: “This is a real breakthrough in our work to bring a real time, non-invasive drug-testing method to the market that will provide a definitive result in a matter of minutes – we are already working on a 30-second method.”
“And, as with previous methods we have developed, it is non-invasive, hygienic and can’t be faked – by the nature of the test, the identity of the subject, and their drug use, is all captured within the sample itself.”
Although this new technique is specifically working with cocaine at this time, researchers say it may also work for other drugs. News of this comes just months after reports of killer batch of cocaine “100% pure” circulating in the United Kingdom.
