[Anchor]

A growing trend has been spreading among some teenagers, involving taking large amounts of cold medicine or painkillers all at once and sharing their experiences online. Starting out of curiosity for temporary hallucinations, an increasing number of teenagers are falling into drug addiction.

Reporter Je Hui-won brings us an in-depth report.

[Reporter]

Seventeen-year-old A first touched drugs three years ago when she was a middle school student.

Looking for a way to soothe her feelings of depression and anxiety, she learned about overdosing through social media—taking large quantities of cold medicine or sleeping pills at once, in what is known as an "OD party."

[A / Teenager with drug addiction experience: I think I started with about five pills at first. Asking someone to recommend a strong medicine, or one with fewer side effects....]

Even while suffering from hallucinations and vomiting, she would turn to pills again on anxious nights.

[A / Teenager with drug addiction experience: (Now) I take about 10 to 20 pills. You feel dizzy, or you see hallucinations, or you hear auditory hallucinations, and your body gets ruined.]

Social media is filled with posts from teenagers asking for recommendations on cold medicine combinations with strong hallucinogenic effects, as well as sharing reviews on how long the drug effects last.

There are even reviews saying that regular pharmacies automatically pack large quantities of medicine without being asked.

The problem is that, unlike alcohol or cigarettes, over-the-counter medicines carry no legal obligation to verify the purchaser's age.

[Pharmacy B: (Can I buy 10?) 20? (10.) 17,000 won. Please wait a moment.]

Some pharmacies even recommend products containing larger quantities.

[Pharmacy C: Shall I give you five? We also have larger ones with 12 pills. This is a bit cheaper.]

With the recent rise of warehouse-style pharmacies that sell over-the-counter drugs in larger quantities at cheaper prices, the barrier to access has become even lower.

[Ryu Jeong-hee / Research Fellow, Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs: In a very specialized format, changes in the body when using 10, 20, 30, or 40 pills are casually shared. Starting with over-the-counter drugs that are the easiest to get their hands on, they end up learning about actual narcotic substances....]

Among all patients treated for drug poisoning, teenage patients have increased by nearly 40% over four years, and nearly 3,000 teenagers visited emergency rooms due to prescription and over-the-counter drug abuse over the past year.

(Video filming: Kim Hak-mo, Bae Moon-san | Video editing: Kim Yoon-sung | Design: Seo Seung-hyun)