It’s the kind of thing you really wish wasn’t neccessary. A nail polish under development could help you detect date rape drugs in your drinks.
Image: Undercover Colors
The polish, called “Undercover Colors” contains chemicals that react to the presence of drugs such as Rohypnol, Xanax, or GHB by changing colour, alerting the user to the fact that their drink has been tampered with.
It’s still in the R&D phase, and is the work of four undergraduate students at North Carolina State University in the US, who state on their Facebook page that
“While date rape drugs are often used to facilitate sexual assault, very little science exists for their detection. Our goal is to invent technologies that empower women to protect themselves from this heinous and quietly pervasive crime.
For our first product, we are developing a nail polish that changes color when it comes in contact with date rape drugs such as Rohypnol, Xanax, and GHB. With our nail polish, any woman will be empowered to discreetly ensure her safety by simply stirring her drink with her finger. If her nail polish changes color, she’ll know that something is wrong.
Through this nail polish and similar technologies, we hope to make potential perpetrators afraid to spike a woman’s drink because there’s now a risk that they can get caught. In effect, we want to shift the fear from the victims to the perpetrators.”
In an ideal world, this wouldn’t be a product we’d need at all because lowlives wouldn’t spike drinks, but that’s sadly just wishful thinking.
It’s still something that’s very much in the prototype stage at this point in time, and presumably also something that’s non-toxic, given you’re going to want to finish that drink after you’ve assured yourself of its relative safety.
[Undercover Colors via Hello Giggles]