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Broward Leads Nation In Flakka Cases

FT LAUDERDALE (CBSMiami) - Another dubious distinction for South Florida.

When it comes to the number of flakka cases per capita in the country, Broward is number one by leaps and bounds, according to the Sun-Sentinel.

Flakka is a synthetic drug related to something called bath salts. It can be smoked, swallowed or injected.

Users often hallucinate while their body temperatures skyrocket. Many people lose control of themselves and have no recollection of what happened.

Flakka is being produced in China. Massive amounts of the drug have been seized at customs in Chicago. Customs officials confirming to CBS4 "Florida is a market and destination point for this dangerous drug."

Records obtained by the Sun-Sentinel showed that crime labs analyzed 477 cases of flakka in Broward last year. That breaks down to a rate of 27 cases per 100,000 residents. The closest county was Chicago's Cook County with 212 cases.

So why is Broward the epicenter for the cheap and dangerous drug. Experts aren't sure. One theory is that the crackdown on pill mills left a void.

From about 2007 through 2010, Broward was the nation's capital in oxycodone sales. More than 9 million tablets were dispensed by storefront clinics in one six-month period alone, according to the DEA. A statewide crackdown and a number of DEA raids shutdown most of the operations and that left pushers and their customers looking for their next cheap high. Enter Flakka which can be bought for as little as $4 or $5.

Last year, Broward accounted for 55 percent of the state's flakka cases last year. Miami-Dade County chalked up the second most 17 percent and Orange County came in third.

Some of the highest flakka rates in the country are turning up in tiny rural counties. Little Sawyer County in the northern reaches of Wisconsin had the highest rate in the nation, according to the Sun-Sentinel. With a population of 16,500, it had the equivalent of 206 flakka cases per every 100,000 people.

The majority of the other rural counties showing unusually high rates of flakka given their small populations are concentrated in Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Virginia, home of the so-called "pillbillies" who flocked to South Florida during the booming pill-mill era to score mass quantities of powerful painkillers and sedatives like oxycodone.

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