The owner of a noodle shop in Shaanxi province has been detained for adding parts of poppy plants (from which opium is derrived) to his noodles, in a cunning attempt to get customers hooked on his food.
The shop owner was held for 10 days and confessed that he had purchased two kilograms of poppy shells (the bud of the flower that contains the plant's seeds) for RMB600 in August.
The restaurant's activities came to light after one customer, Liu Juyou, 26, tested positive for drug use during a routine urine test under an anti-drink-driving program. Liu claimed that he had never taken illegal substances in his life and was shocked at the test results.
Liu was detained for 15 days from September 3, unable to convince the police of his suspicion that the drug came from the restaurant's noodles. Instead, he asked his family to all eat at the restaurant and then take urine tests at home. They also tested positive for opium and showed their results to the police.
Unfortunarely, despite the fact that the noodle shop owner was detained and was believed to be responsible, Liu's appeals were still disregarded by the police, who said that it was their duty to find and punish drug users.
Although eating poppy seeds is not the same as smoking opium or injecting heroin, those who eat enough of them can still test positive for opiates on a drug test. A Chinese anti-narcotics police agent said that eating the seeds over a long term could still have an addictive effect.
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