Jenkem!
Status: Unwarranted Drug Scare
The Collier County Sheriff's office in Naples, Florida has issued a strange bulletin warning that American kids are experimenting with a new way to get high. It's called Jenkem, and it involves sniffing the fermenting gas from human sewage. You put the sewage in a bottle topped with a balloon to catch the gas. You then inhale the gas which gives you a euphoric high. In other words, you're sniffing fermenting human feces.Jenkem appears to be real. Back in 1999 the BBC reported that street children in the slums of Zambia were using this method to get high:
Nobody knows exactly where the idea for making Jenkem came from, but it has been used by street-children in Lusaka for at least two years. Nason Banda of the Drug Enforcement Agency is not proud when he says that it is unique to Zambia. He shudders when he sees the boys at the sewage ponds, scavenging for faecal matter to make Jenkem.
However, are American children now turning to Jenkem to get high? Unlikely. David Emery of About.com has done some research to debunk this latest drug scare. He notes that the Sheriff's office has confirmed that it issued the bulletin, however Emery discovered that the pictures in the bulletin come from a thread on Totse.com, in which one guy claimed to have tried Jenkem, and supplied the pictures as proof. But the same guy later admitted he was just joking. The fermenting feces in the picture were really a dough made from flour and water and rolled in Nutella. The urine was beer and water. Emery notes:
It is plain to see that directly or indirectly, the author of the Collier County Sheriff's bulletin based his or her presentation on faulty Internet sources, borrowing photos from a message board posting that was later admitted to be hoax, and quoting invented "facts" from a Website noted for its far-out satirical chicanery.
He also theorizes that, "The word "Jenkem" may be a corruption of "Genkem," which is the brand name of a glue manufactured in South Africa reputed to be very popular among drug users. In some places "Genkem" has come to refer generically to any form of glue or solvent inhaled as an intoxicant."
Posted By: Alex | Date: Thu Nov 08, 2007 | Permalink |
Total Comments: 12
Category: Gross, Health/Medicine
Category: Gross, Health/Medicine
Listed in chronological order. Newest comments at the end.
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I think someone who could enjoy huffing sewer gas would have to already be high.
Posted by Big Gary in Texas City, Texas on Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 02:01 PM
It's basically just methane. You might as well huff BBQ gas, natural gas, or anything else that cuts off your oxygen.
Surely anyone that has the patience to ferment sewerage can find other highs faster.
Posted by AussieBruce on Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 02:18 PM
Surely anyone that has the patience to ferment sewerage can find other highs faster.
The BBC can get things wrong, you know.
Posted by M Henderson in London, UK on Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 02:26 PM
I can't believe anyone bought this. Drugs are far too easy to get ahold of to need to sniff human shit 
Posted by Renquist in Glasgow, Scotland on Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 04:05 PM
I read a thing a few years ago about kids on the street putting glue in old coke cans. Then they periodically sniffed the cans to take the edge off their hunger.
Posted by Maegan in Tampa, FL - USA on Thu Nov 08, 2007 at 07:48 PM
I've never been told my farts have an "intoxicating odor about them", in fact usually the average person will leave in disgust...
Posted by Christopher in Pensacola, Florida on Fri Nov 09, 2007 at 05:11 AM
I read an article a few years ago about a house that was raided because of suspected drug use or manufacturing. Instead the found adults huffing heated dog feces. If I remember right they weren't charged, because apparently it wasn't illegal.
Posted by Dr. N E O in Everywhere and nowhere on Fri Nov 09, 2007 at 02:05 PM
hey, man... wanna hit of this? It's primo Dalmation... wish we had some more of that Saint Bernard- that stuff was ill... Now I've got the munchies... let's go out for Milkbones and cat turds... screw it, they deliver... where's the phone? I can't see straight, I'm so pooped out...
Posted by Hairy Houdini on Sun Nov 11, 2007 at 08:25 AM
Wake and jenk, y0.
Apparently, it's a powerful hallucinagen. In the original story, the gutter orphan said that it lets him see his dead mother. It was a pretty harsh story.
But, I'm sure these kids (in Zimbabwe) do it, because they already live near an open sewers, and they're homeless orphans and all.
Posted by caio on Sun Nov 11, 2007 at 10:51 PM
Apparently, it's a powerful hallucinagen. In the original story, the gutter orphan said that it lets him see his dead mother. It was a pretty harsh story.
But, I'm sure these kids (in Zimbabwe) do it, because they already live near an open sewers, and they're homeless orphans and all.
I know a shitload of Marines that do this stuff everyday in Iraq! It really helps the boredom!!
Posted by Cpl Hunter in Iraq on Tue Nov 20, 2007 at 05:29 PM
So this defiantly isn’t for real? If it was they could just fart in each others faces and then return the favor? Would be interesting if it was real and people caught onto it and it became a ‘big thing’ in the drug world. Would be strange seeing lots of people being admitted to drug rehab clinics for doing poo.
Posted by Drug Rehab Clinic on Sun Apr 27, 2008 at 05:26 PM
Jenkem is an alleged hallucinogenic recreational drug composed of noxious gas formed from fermented human feces. In the early and mid-1990s, several reports stated that Jenkem was being used by Zambian street children. In November 2007, anecdotal American media reports gave the impression that Jenkem was a popular drug taking hold with American teenagers. Media reports were characterized by disbelief and distaste for the "grossness" of the phenomenon
Posted by Pharmacy in USA on Thu Jul 31, 2008 at 07:44 PM
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