Bath salts is the common name for yet another street drug that's making inroads with young people.
The experimental drug is designed to stimulate the same neurological receptors as cannabis, but it does not contain any cannabis. Stage I and II drug trials can be very tricky, as one of the questions to be answered is what would the effective dose be if it does, indeed, work. Volunteers in drug trials are told this going in -- but very few imagine this sort of outcome, because this outcome is quite rare.
Despite the use of cannabis for pain and nausea reduction, especially in cancer patients, there are many pain medications, both opioids and non-opioids, that have changed millions of lives for the better. (Unfortunately the opposite is also true, in the case of addiction.) Proper treatment for pain through the use of meds is falling by the wayside in the U.S. as ethical and compassionate doctors are more and more reluctant to prescribe given the hoops the government makes them jump through and the risk of losing their medical license.
I'm a nurse myself who for years worked in pain management (surgical); I have also had 4 spinal fusion procedures and am now disabled due to my crummy spine. I don't take any opioids by choice, but I doubt even I could get any prescription without going to a pain management clinic every month to get a paper script, and we can't afford either the visits (at specialist rates) or the meds themselves.