Disposable dipper to detect "date rape" drug is launched

A disposable test strip that can indicate whether a drink has been spiked with the "date rape" drug Rohypnol has been launched in the UK.

Dipitin costs £4.99 for three test strips. It will detect small amounts of any benzodiazepine - the class of sedatives to which Rohypnol belongs. However, it cannot detect GHB (gamma hydroxybutryic acid), which is also commonly used as a date rape drug.

"But we are working on a test strip that will also detect GHB," says Jim Campbell of SureScreen Diagnostics. "We hope that an integrated test will be available by the end of the year."

So-called date rape drugs are tasteless, odourless and colourless. In 2001, the number of women and men reporting being drugged and raped is rising by 50 per cent each month, says the UK's Drug Rape Trust.

LGC in Middlesex, which is being funded by the UK government to research ways of producing a cheap test for any of 40 date rape drugs, warns that women using the strip should not be complacent. Alcohol and recreational drugs are much more commonly implicated in drug-assisted sexual assault than sedatives, the company says.

Acid test

SureScreen developed its test by screening hundreds of combinations of benzodiazepine antibodies until they found a group that would detect tiny quantities of the drug and work well in alcohol or acids found in fizzy drinks or fruit juices.

The test, marketed as Dipitin in the UK and US, takes between 45 seconds and one minute to complete. The end of the strip is dipped in the drink and changes from blue to red in the presence of a benzodiazepine.

"We set the cut off limit so that the test will pick up the tiniest tablet available dissolved in one pint of liquid," says Campbell.

The test kit is only available by mail order. However Campbell says the company is in talks to sell the kits through shops and bars.

Swizzlesticks

Although the price tag is too high for a user to test every drink, Campbell says: "It will allow people to test a drink if they're suspicious, because they perhaps left it unattended or it tastes odd."

The LGC wants date rape drug swizzlesticks to be cheap enough to be given away free with drinks in nightclubs and bars.

"The ultimate swizzlestick will be able to cheaply test all kinds of drugs," says a spokeswoman for the LGC. This would include a test for alcohol, so a woman drinking what she thinks is fruit juice can be sure her drink has not been spiked.