A drug marketed as "pink cocaine" is turning up more often in U.S. nightclubs and busts, alarming health officials because it's usually not cocaine at all. And no two batches are the same.
Why it matters: The potent powder — part of a new wave of polydrugs — is a dangerous cocktail of drugs, commonly ketamine and ecstasy, sometimes mixed with methamphetamine or fentanyl.
- That unpredictability sharply raises the risk of overdose.
- The drug is growing in popularity, sold online in custom baggies and is referenced regularly on social media by enthusiasts and musicians.
Catch up quick: Authorities from Los Angeles to Miami in recent months have reported busts or issued strong warnings involving pink cocaine, also known as tuci or tusi.
- In 2025, New York investigators seized pink cocaine along with dozens of guns in a Tren de Aragua-linked trafficking case.
- U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced in April that DEA agents raided an "underground nightclub" in Colorado Springs, Colo., to arrest undocumented immigrants and seized pink cocaine.
- A Miami-Dade medical examiner case series describes multiple fatalities from September 2020 to July 2024 involving "tusi/pink cocaine."
What's inside: Tuci has no standard formula but is a volatile mix of stimulants, depressants, and opioids that can be mixed locally from other drugs and dyes.
- Lab tests most often find ketamine and ecstasy (MDMA), but samples have also contained methamphetamine, cocaine, opioids and fentanyl, with added pink dye.
Users' experiences can range from euphoria, increased energy and sociability to sensory enhancement and emotional openness.
- They also report altered perception, hallucinations or dissociative effects, while other mixes give users anxiety, paranoia, confusion and strange or disturbing thoughts.
Context: Pink cocaine originated in Colombia in the late 2000s and early 2010s as a club and party drug that initially mimicked or contained traces of the psychedelic phenethylamine 2C-B or 2C.
- It gave rise to a new group of narcos who Latinized the term "2C" and pronounced the new product "tusi" while adding pink dye as a branding strategy, per Vice.
- The drug has since made its way north and Europe.
What they're saying: "Tusi is not just being imported as a drug. It's the importation of an idea," Joseph J. Palamar, Professor of Population Health at NYU Langone Health, tells Axios.
- Palamar said tusi doesn't need to be smuggled as a finished product. Once the concept arrived from Latin America, dealers could recreate it locally using whatever drugs they had access to.
- The pink dye makes the drug "Instagrammable," said Palamar, because it looks new and exciting despite the risks. "If it weren't a pink powder, I don't think it would be this popular."
Threat level: Poison centers are seeing cases where tuci users believe they are taking a mild psychedelic or stimulant, but instead ingest dangerous combinations that can affect the heart, brain and breathing, Kaitlyn Brown, clinical managing director for America's Poison Centers, tells Axios.
- "There is no antidote for pink cocaine. All responders can do is support the patient while the drugs clear their system."
- Brown said first responders use naloxone to help patients and provide other care on the scene while authorities remain in contact with their regional poison centers to obtain any new information about the drug.
Zoom out: Researchers estimated that 2.7% of New York's electronic dance music scene-nightclub attendees used tusi in 2024 — a snapshot suggesting it's in active circulation in the club world.
- America's Poison Centers reported 18 "pink cocaine" exposures across four states since January 2024, with most needing medical treatment.
- An initial toxicology report revealed that former One Direction singer Liam Payne had pink cocaine in his body when he fell to his death from a balcony in Argentina in 2024.
- During Sean "Diddy" Combs' recent federal trial in Manhattan, a former assistant testified that part of his job was procuring and stocking narcotics, including tusi, for parties.
What we're watching: Tusi appears to be making its way to rural America.
- In Louisiana, for example, local officials in Tangipahoa Paris publicly warned that pink cocaine was being linked to fatal overdoses in the area.
