question: At what point does a substance become a drug?
comment: Caffeine actually is a drug, as are alcohol and nicotine. They are just culturally accepted. In terms of 'substances' they are generally chemicals with psychoactive effects - they have an effect on the brain. This includes a huge range of things from caffeine to paracetamol to anti-depressants to methamphetamine or heroin.
passages: Drugs in the United States
  
  In the United States, the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act defined the word "drug" as an "article intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease in man or other animals" and those "(other than food) intended to affect the structure or any function of the body of man or other animals." Consistent with that definition, the U.S. separately defines narcotic drugs and controlled substances, which may include non-drugs, and explicitly excludes tobacco, caffeine and alcoholic beverages.
  
  Section::::Federal drug policy.
  
  BULLET::::- History of United States drug prohibition
   Other drugs known as designer drugs are produced. An early example of what today would be labelled a 'designer drug' was LSD, which was synthesised from ergot. Other examples include analogs of performance-enhancing drugs such as designer steroids taken to improve physical capabilities and these are sometimes used (legally or not) for this purpose, often by professional athletes. Other designer drugs mimic the effects of psychoactive drugs. Since the late 1990s there has been the identification of many of these synthesised drugs. In Japan and the United Kingdom this has spurred the addition of many designer drugs into a newer class of controlled substances known as a temporary class drug.
   Drug
  
  A drug is any substance that causes a change in an organism's physiology or psychology when consumed.
  
  Drugs are typically distinguished from food and substances that provide nutritional support. Consumption of drugs can be via inhalation, injection, smoking, ingestion, absorption via a patch on the skin, or dissolution under the tongue.
   In pharmacology, a drug is a chemical substance, typically of known structure, which, when administered to a living organism, produces a biological effect. A pharmaceutical drug, also called a medication or medicine, is a chemical substance used to treat, cure, prevent, or diagnose a disease or to promote well-being. Traditionally drugs were obtained through extraction from medicinal plants, but more recently also by organic synthesis. Pharmaceutical drugs may be used for a limited duration, or on a regular basis for chronic disorders.
   Sense of "any illegal drug" first recorded 1926, Amer.Eng. The adj. is first attested c.1600. There are many different types of narcotics. The two most common forms of narcotic drugs are morphine and codeine. Both are synthesized from opium for medicinal use. The most commonly used drug for recreational purposes created from opium is heroin. Synthesized drugs created with an opium base for use in pain management are fentanyl, oxycodone, tramadol, demarol, hydrocodone, methadone, and hydromorphone.
   Botanical drug
  
  A botanical drug is defined in the United States Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act as a botanical product that is marketed as diagnosing, mitigating, treating, or curing a disease; a botanical product in turn, is a finished, labeled product that contains ingredients from plants. Chemicals that are purified from plants, like paclitaxel, and highly purified products of industrial fermentation, like biopharmaceuticals, are not considered to be botanical products.
  
  In 2006 the Food and Drug Administration approved the first botanical drug in the United States: sinecatechins, a green tea extract for genital warts.
  
  Section::::Definition.
   The best example is the definition of "narcotics" in the United Nations Conventions. Narcotics are substances and preparations that induce drowsiness, sleep, stupor, insensibility, etc., and that these effects (and their rate) are complicated to prove, e.g. during litigation. Thus, the legal definition of a narcotic is whether or not it is listed on the Schedules of the Convention. If it is on some of the Schedules, it is narcotic.
  
  Section::::World Health Organization.:Lexicon of alcohol and drug terms published by the World Health Organization.
   "Drugs", in the context of "prohibition," are any of a number of psychoactive substances whose use a government or religious body seeks to control. What constitutes a "drug" varies by century and belief system. What is a psychoactive substance is relatively well known to modern science. Examples include a range from caffeine found in coffee, tea, and chocolate, nicotine in tobacco products; botanical extracts morphine and heroin, and synthetic compounds MDMA and Fentanyl. Almost without exception, these substances also have a medical use, in which case it is called a Pharmaceutical drug or just "pharmaceutical." The use of medicine to save or extend life or to alleviate suffering is uncontroversial in most cultures. "Prohibition" applies to certain conditions of possession or use. "Recreational use" refers to the use of substances primarily for their psychoactive effect outside of a clinical situation or doctor's care.
   Section::::Etymology.
  
  In English, the noun "drug" is thought to originate from Old French "drogue", possibly deriving later into "droge-vate" from Middle Dutch meaning "dry barrels", referring to medicinal plants preserved in them. The transitive verb "to drug" (meaning intentionally administer a substance to someone, often without their knowledge) arose later and invokes the psychoactive rather than medicinal properties of a substance.
  
  Section::::Medication.
   During the first half of the 20th century, generic names for drugs were often coined by contracting the chemical names into fewer syllables. Such contraction was partially, informally, locally standardized, but it was not universally consistent. In the second half of the 20th century, the nomenclatural systems moved away from such contraction toward the present system of stems and affixes that show chemical relationships.
   BULLET::::- ephedrine (as well as pseudoephedrine and norephedrine) is regulated as an UN-controlled drug precursor.
  
  The following are scheduled by Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs.
  
  Cannabis:
  
  BULLET::::- cannabis — the flowering or fruiting tops of the cannabis plant (resin not extracted)
  
  BULLET::::- cannabis resin — the separated resin, crude or purified, obtained from the cannabis plant
  
  BULLET::::- extracts and tinctures of cannabis
  
  Coca leaf, cocaine and ecgonine:
  
  BULLET::::- Coca leaf — the leaf of the coca bush (plant material), except a leaf from which all ecgonine, cocaine and any other ecgonine alkaloids have been removed
   The term "narcotic" is believed to have been coined by the Greek physician Galen to refer to agents that numb or deaden, causing loss of feeling or paralysis. It is based on the Greek word "ναρκωσις" (narcosis)"," the term used by Hippocrates for the process of numbing or the numbed state. Galen listed mandrake root, altercus (eclata), seeds, and poppy juice (opium) as the chief examples. It originally referred to any substance that relieved pain, dulled the senses, or induced sleep. Now, the term is used in a number of ways. Some people define narcotics as substances that bind at opioid receptors (cellular membrane proteins activated by substances like heroin or morphine) while others refer to any illicit substance as a narcotic. From a U.S. legal perspective, narcotics refer to opium, opium derivatives, and their semi-synthetic substitutes, though in U.S. law, due to its numbing properties, cocaine is also considered a narcotic.
   Section::::Law.
  
  Due to the recent development of many designer drugs, laws banning or regulating their use have not been developed yet, and in recent cases novel drugs have appeared directly in response to legislative action, to replace a similar compound that had recently been banned. Many of the chemicals fall under the various drug analogue legislations in certain countries, but most countries have no general analogue act or equivalent legislation and so novel compounds may fall outside of the law after only minor structural modifications.
   Section::::Law.:Common names.
  
  In the UK to avoid being controlled by the Medicines Act, designer drugs such as mephedrone have been described as "plant food," despite the compounds having no history of being used for these purposes.
  
  In the USA, similar descriptions ("bath salts" is the most common) have been used to describe mephedrone as well as methylone and methylenedioxypyrovalerone (MDPV). Combined with labeling that they are "not for human consumption," these descriptions are an attempt to skirt the Federal Analog Act which forbids drugs that are “substantially similar” to already classified drugs from being sold for human use.
   (b) As used in parts 1301 through 1308 and part 1312 of this chapter, the following terms shall have the meanings specified:
  
  (30) The term narcotic drug means any of the following whether produced directly or indirectly by extraction from substances of vegetable origin or independently by means of chemical synthesis or by a combination of extraction and chemical synthesis:
   (d) any compound (not being a compound for the time being specified in sub-paragraph (a) above) structurally derived from fentanyl by modification in any of the following ways, that is to say,
  
  (e) any compound (not being a compound for the time being specified in sub-paragraph (a) above) structurally derived from pethidine by modification in any of the following ways, that is to say,
   Following the passage of the second International Opium Convention in 1925, which specifically banned morphine, the diacetyl ester of morphine, heroin, and a number of alternative esters of morphine quickly started to be manufactured and sold. The most notable of these were dibenzoylmorphine and acetylpropionylmorphine, which have virtually identical effects to heroin but were not covered by the Opium Convention. This then led the Health Committee of the League of Nations to pass several resolutions attempting to bring these new drugs under control, ultimately leading in 1930 to the first broad analogues provisions extending legal control to all esters of morphine, oxycodone, and hydromorphone. Another early example of what could loosely be termed designer drug use, was during the Prohibition era in the 1930s, when diethyl ether was sold and used as an alternative to illegal alcoholic beverages in a number of countries.
   Synthetic cannabinoids are known under a variety of names including K2, Spice, Black Mamba, Bombay Blue, Genie, Zohai, Banana Cream Nuke, Krypton, and Lava Red. They are often called “synthetic marijuana,” “herbal incense,” or “herbal smoking blends” and often labeled “not for human consumption.”
  
  Section::::See also.
  
  BULLET::::- Controlled Substances Act
  
  BULLET::::- Controlled Substance Analogue Enforcement of 1986
  
  BULLET::::- New chemical entity
  
  BULLET::::- Operation Web Tryp
  
  BULLET::::- Pharmaceutical company
  
  BULLET::::- Psychoactive Substances Act 2013 – New Zealand
  
  BULLET::::- Psychoactive Substances Act 2016 – UK ban on all drugs based on psychoactive effect
  
  BULLET::::- Research chemical
  
  Section::::External links.
   As early as 2012, Third Eye Blind frontman Stephan Jenkins stated that following the release of their fifth album, they would cease releasing full albums, in favor of smaller EP releases. After the band released their fifth album, "Dopamine", in June 2015, Jenkins stated there were five to six songs from the "Dopamine" sessions that—once he had time to finish them after the band finished touring to support "Dopamine"—he would want to release. Several months later, Jenkins began discussing plans for a new EP release in mid-2016.
  
  Section::::Writing and recording.
   BULLET::::- "psychotropic substance" means any substance, natural or synthetic, or any natural material or any salt or preparation of such substance or material included in the list of psychotropic substances specified in the Schedule;
  
  BULLET::::- "use", in relation to narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances, means any kind of use except personal consumption.
   Mephedrone was first synthesized in 1929, but did not become widely known until it was rediscovered in 2003. By 2007, mephedrone was reported to be available for sale on the Internet; by 2008 law enforcement agencies had become aware of the compound; and, by 2010, it had been reported in most of Europe, becoming particularly prevalent in the United Kingdom. Mephedrone was first made illegal in Israel in 2008, followed by Sweden later that year. In 2010, it was made illegal in many European countries, and, in December 2010, the EU ruled it illegal. In Australia, New Zealand, and the US, it is considered an analog of other illegal drugs and can be controlled by laws similar to the Federal Analog Act. In September 2011, the USA temporarily classified mephedrone as illegal, in effect from October 2011.
   The modern use of the term designer drug was coined in the 1980s to refer to various synthetic opioid drugs, based mostly on the fentanyl molecule (such as α-methylfentanyl). The term gained widespread popularity when MDMA (ecstasy) experienced a popularity boom in the mid-1980s. When the term was coined in the 1980s, a wide range of narcotics were being sold as heroin on the black market. Many were based on fentanyl or meperidine. One, MPPP, was found in some cases to contain an impurity called MPTP, which caused brain damage that could result in a syndrome identical to full-blown Parkinson's disease, from only a single dose. Other problems were highly potent fentanyl analogues, which were sold as China White, that caused many accidental overdoses.
   The early twentieth century brought increased regulation of all manner of narcotics, including paregoric, as the addictive properties of opium became more widely understood, and "patent medicines came under fire largely because of their mysterious compositions". In the United States, the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 required that certain specified drugs, including alcohol, cocaine, heroin, morphine, and cannabis, be accurately labeled with contents and dosage. Previously many drugs had been sold as patent medicines with secret ingredients or misleading labels. Cocaine, heroin, cannabis, and other such drugs continued to be legally available without prescription as long as they were labeled. It is estimated that sale of patent medicines containing opiates decreased by 33% after labeling was mandated. In 1906 in Britain and in 1908 in Canada "laws requiring disclosure of ingredients and limitation of narcotic content were instituted".
   Pharmaceutical drugs are often classified into drug classes—groups of related drugs that have similar chemical structures, the same mechanism of action (binding to the same biological target), a related mode of action, and that are used to treat the same disease. The Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical Classification System (ATC), the most widely used drug classification system, assigns drugs a unique ATC code, which is an alphanumeric code that assigns it to specific drug classes within the ATC system. Another major classification system is the Biopharmaceutics Classification System. This classifies drugs according to their solubility and permeability or absorption properties.
   There may be an age restriction on the consumption and purchase of legal recreational drugs. Some recreational drugs that are legal and accepted in many places include alcohol, tobacco, betel nut, and caffeine products, and in some areas of the world the legal use of drugs such as khat is common.
  
  There are a number of legal intoxicants commonly called "legal highs" that are used recreationally. The most widely used of these is alcohol.
  
  Section::::Administration of drugs.
  
  All drugs, can be administered via a number of routes, and many can be administered by more than one.
  
  Section::::Control of drugs.
  