Sierra Leone’s president Julius Maada Bio has declared a national emergency over the rampant spread of kush, a psychoactive drug mixed with human bones that he labelled a “death trap,” posing an “existential risk” to his country.

Reports have been describing zombie-like groups of mostly young men sitting on street corners with swollen limbs and red eyes, as kush abuse is becoming a common sight in the West African country.

Addicts have been observed digging up human bones in an effort to create the controversial substance, as ground-up human bone is one of the main ingredients in kush. Other ingredients of this deadly cocktail include synthetic drugs like fentanyl and tramadol, and chemicals like formaldehyde, cannabis, herbs, and disinfectants.

However, some of the drug’s users don’t seem to know what makes up the substance. “I don’t know what it’s made of this kush, I just smoke it”, says Mustapha, a kush addict interviewed by The Guardian.

Kush is fairly cheap to purchase and provides a lengthy, hypnotic high that takes users out of reality for several hours. It first surfaced in the country about six years ago and has grown in popularity since then.

Hundreds of young men have recently died of organ failure linked to the narcotic, one doctor from the capital city of Freetown told the BBC.

Alarmingly, the drug is now also spreading to other West African countries. Many young people in West and Central Africa have become addicted to drugs with between 5.2 per cent and 13.5 per cent using cannabis, according to the World Health Organization.

Those who survive the highly dangerous substance still have to face the dramatic toll on mental health that it causes. The Psychiatric Hospital in Sierra Leone—the country’s only mental health institution—says that between 2020 and 2023, admissions linked to kush surged by almost 4,000 per cent to reach roughly 1,865 new patients.

The nation’s only drug rehab centre, located in Freetown, opened this year with just 100 beds, which is not nearly enough to cover the amount of people currently addicted or the ever-growing influx of addicts.

In a nationwide TV broadcast in April, President Bio stated: “Our country is currently faced with an existential threat due to the ravaging impact of drugs and substance abuse, particularly the devastating synthetic drug kush.”

The president directed officials to set up a National Task Force on Drugs and Substance Abuse, which will primarily focus on “combatting the kush crisis.” His plans to wage war on kush mainly consist of expanding police powers to raid suspected dealers and manufacturers. Confiscated drugs are currently being burned.

However, this is also pushing users further out of their communities and into drug hideouts in mangrove swamps. And as the ingredients to make kush are becoming harder to find, people are turning to increasingly dangerous methods of getting high, further jeopardising their safety.

As there are limited rehabilitation options available, vulnerable individuals are turning away from official resources towards independent offerings like controversial ‘kush healers’.

This once again puts the few resources the population has to protect itself or recover from drugs on full display, as the government continues to pursue its violent crackdown, which addresses the root causes of its crisis and the needs of those suffering from it the most.