New coaster detects common date rape drugs, but some have doubts

A Florida inventor and a New York dentist have created a product they believe can detect any… A Florida inventor and a New York dentist have created a product they believe can detect any illicit drugs in an alcoholic drink, specifically the two most popular date rape drugs.

Francisco Guerra, founder and president of Snow Masters and Foammasters, two corporations that make evaporative snow and foam machines, and Dr. Brian Glover, a dentist from New York, invented the Drink Safe Coaster, a square, 4-inch coaster with two test circles that change colors when a drink is contaminated, according to the Drink Safe Technologies, Inc. Web site.

The directions for using the Drink Safe Coaster, printed on the back of the coaster, are as follows: place drops from the drink to be tested onto each dry test spot on the coaster using a swizzle stick, straw or fingers and rub gently. Do not mix the chemicals from each spot with each other. If either spot turns to a darker blue color after a few minutes, the drink is contaminated and should be discarded.

According to Guerra’s wife Cheril, Guerra was driven to create a product that could detect the date rape drug when a close friend was impregnated after she fell victim to date rape about two years ago. She said he teamed with Glover, a dentist with an extensive background in chemistry, and began manufacturing products explicitly for the purpose of detecting date rape drugs.

Guerra said the product works just like a pregnancy test. She said the current version for sale is Beta Test 1.2, a coaster that was tested hundreds of times for accuracies and proven to be quite reliable.

She said the coaster is not to be used with any milk products because of its oils, and for people not to be deceived if a drink is blue.

She said in the first 100 tests, it produced a “false positive” only one time.

“We put it through every lab test with all kinds of liquors – rum, beer, alcohol and the like – and only one time did it incorrectly change colors,” she said.

But according to B.J. Horn, the executive director of Pittsburgh Action Against Rape, there are some problems with the coasters which have been brought to their attention.

“We received a fax from the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape,” Horn said, “and it lists seven concerns with the coasters, four of which came from a chemist with the [Federal Bureau of Investigation].”

“Among the concerns with the coasters is that there are some false positives indicated with the test spots,” she said. “Also, it doesn’t test for every drug, so people may get lured into a false sense of security.”

According to information provided by Drink Safe Technologies, the coaster is best at detecting the two most powerful and often used date rape drugs: gamma hydroxy-butyrate and ketamine.

GHB is a sedative for the central nervous system that can cause drowsiness, dizziness, nausea, unconsciousness, seizures, respiratory depression and coma, according to the Drink Safe Web site. Since 1990, there have been 5,700 documented cases of GHB abuse in reported sexual assaults, according to the Web site.

Similarly, ketamine can cause amnesia, impaired motor function, high blood pressure, depression and respiratory problems, according to the Drink Safe Web site. Low-dose intoxication of ketamine can result in impaired attention and memory, and can be added to beverages unknowingly because it is often colorless, odorless and tasteless, according to the Web site.

The information provided by Drink Safe Technologies said “it is safe to state that both [GHB] and ketamine are covered by our test.”

But Horn said this is information that she considered “accurate, but incomplete.”

“GHB can be made in home laboratories and the ingredients vary from batch to batch,” she said. “So it may test for some GHB, but there are so many variations that the coaster can’t detect all of them.”

She added that although the coaster does test for ketamine, it can take up to 10 minutes for a result, and the result is sometimes unclear.”

Guerra referred all “scientific” questions regarding the accuracy of the coaster and its testing to Glover, who could not be reached for comment.

Guerra said they started marketing the product four months ago to local liquor stores, but owners “wanted nothing to do with it.” She said liquor companies did not want to be responsible for the product’s use or misuse.

Drink Safe marketers then turned to local and national beer distributors, according to Guerra, and reaction was extremely positive. She said the product has since moved beyond the United States borders and is now on sale in Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom.

Horn said the coaster is well-intentioned, and it will help some people in some cases, but not everyone in every situation.

“It would take a lot of information and education for people to use the coaster regularly,” she said. “And I don’t think many people are going to read the warnings and disclaimers while sitting at a bar.”

According to About Inc., an Internet network subject site, one out of every five women will fall victim to date rape before they reach the age of 25.