Turkey sees further rise in number of bonzai victims

Adding to the growing concerns over the rising use of the drug phenazepam, popularly known as bonzai, a young boy died and another entered a coma on Friday in different provinces of Turkey.

In Mersin, 16-year-old Fırat Parlak was hospitalized after he was found unconscious in a mosque. Despite all efforts, the teenager died in Mersin State Hospital. His father Fahri Parlak said that his son had been pressured into using bonzai. Vowing to fight against the drug, Fahri Parlak said that he would urge other young people not to take drugs and share the same fate as his son. “All I want is for the police to find who made my son take drugs,” he told the media. His mother Hamdiye Parlak added that her son had just started working at a car-washing center a few days ago.

In Antalya, 22-year-old Ferhat K. remains in an intensive care unit after using a mixture of bonzai and opium. Police officers found the young man on the street and took him to Akdeniz University Hospital.

Bonzai continues to be a growing threat in Turkey. According to figures released by the Ministry of Health in the last week of August, bonzai has claimed 847 lives in the last four years. The youngest victim was 15 years old, while the average age of bonzai users is 24. Currently there are 405 patients receiving treatment for bonzai addiction. Statistics released by the Turkish Statistics Institute (TurkStat) in August revealed that the average age of people starting to use bonzai has recently dropped down to below 11.

According to AMBAUM, a drug treatment center in Antalya, the number of patients who have asked for treatment for bonzai addiction has increased threefold over the last two years. AMBAUM's director, Professor Murat Kuloğlu, told the media that while there were 3,801 applications to the clinic in 2012, this number rose to 7,349 in 2013.

Professor Ömer Geçici, another academic working at AMBAUM, stated that on average, their center examines 60-80 patients per day. One of the patients, 22-year-old Mustafa, who has been a substance addict for nine years, says that he started treatment four months ago. However, he says that since he was not able to change his environment, he was not able to shake off his addiction. He says that addicts should receive treatment as inpatients. Most patients complain that the treatment provided by the center in insufficient.

Bonzai has been labeled as one of the most dangerous and rapidly spreading narcotics in the world by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).