A devastated mother has begged ministers to reclassify the party drug ketamine as class A, following the harrowing death of her 20 year-old daughter who suffered a two-year addiction to the drug.
Sophie Russell, from Lincolnshire, first took ketamine — which killed TV star Matthew Perry — in 2021, when she was offered it during a night out with friends.
But soon she’d developed a rampant addiction and was taking the drug daily, which caused debilitating physical consequences including agonising abdominal pains and incontinence.
The drug can damage the lining of the bladder, causing it to become so scarred that it shrinks.
Ms Russell, who worked as an assistant in a primary school, was admitted to an inpatient addiction treatment service for a week — but it failed to kick the habit long-term.
Her mother, Tracy Marelli, said community addiction specialists let her daughter down after she was discharged from hospital.
‘I feel she was let down by the whole system…I begged the drug support worker to admit her to rehab before she died,’ she said.
In late September Ms Russell travelled to her father’s house to take a bath in a bid to help her pain.
Tracy Marelli, 48, said that everyone loved her daughter, Sophie Russell, who died aged 20 following a ketamine addiction.
Ms Russell is said to have started using the party drug as a way of coping with grief she suffered after the death of her grandmother (pictured left).
She went to bed that night and never woke up.
The family are still awaiting the toxicology results to determine the cause of Sophie’s death.
Ms Marelli, 48, said of the moment she learned her daughter had died: ‘I screamed and fell to the floor. This drug destroyed her.’
She believes Ms Russell first began using ketamine frequently as a method of numbing grief she felt following the death of her grandmother.
‘Around mid-November time in 2021 she started going out with her friends and began taking ketamine while out partying as a lot of young people do,’ she said.
‘I wasn’t aware that she was taking drugs at all.
‘The first time I knew something was wrong, I kept ringing her up and she was slurring. She couldn’t get some of her words out. This was happening quite often.
‘I think I found out about her drug use when I found powder in her room. I asked her why she did it and she said it takes her away from this world and it’s a happier, better place.
