VIENNA, Austria – 24 June 2026
New controls
The Secretary-General communicated the scheduling decisions from the 69th Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) to all Member States on 29 May 2026:
--> These decisions are effective from 29 May 2026.
--> This decision is effective from 25 November 2026.
Emergence and prevalence
The
UNODC Early Warning Advisory on New Psychoactive Substances (EWA) continues to provide real‑time information on global detections across multiple data sources and matrices, supporting early warning and monitoring efforts. Data are reported worldwide and aggregated through the UNODC EWA
Public and
Pro (
registered users only) dashboards, offering insights into trends, substance characteristics, and supporting analytical, pharmacological and toxicological information, when logged in.
N-pyrrolidino isotonitazene (isotonitazepyne): A nitazene-type synthetic opioid first reported in 2023 and now identified in 11 countries across Europe, North America and Oceania. It has also been reported in toxicological cases, including 3 post‑mortem and 1 clinical admission case, all involving blood samples.
N-desethyl etonitazene: A nitazene-type synthetic opioid first reported in 2021 and now identified in 10 countries across Asia, Europe, North America, Oceania and South America.
N-desethyl etonitazene, also a metabolite of etonitazene, has been reported in 2 post‑mortem cases involving blood samples.
MDMB-FUBINACA: A synthetic cannabinoid first reported in 2015 and now reported in 26 countries across Asia, Europe, North America and South America. Reporting increased significantly in 2024, with a four‑fold rise in detections from 5 in 2023 to 18 in 2024. A total of 113 toxicology cases have been reported, primarily from 2024-2025, most of which related to drug use, alongside a small number of post-mortem, clinical admission, and driving-under-the-influence-of-drugs (DUID) cases. The matrices reported were predominantly urine, with fewer hair and blood samples.
Background
The
69th session of
CND took place from 9-13 March 2026 in Vienna, focusing on global drug policy, treaty implementation, and emerging drug trends. The session brought together 2,078 participants from 134 Member States, 20 intergovernmental organisations, 9 UN entities, and 198 NGO’s, reflecting broad international engagement in addressing evolving drug challenges. In carrying out its treaty-mandated functions, the Commission decided to place three substances under international control following recommendations from the World Health Organization (WHO)
Expert Committee on Drug Dependence (ECDD).
Way forward
The Commission adopted a number of
resolutions that addressed evolving synthetic drug threats including
one specifically on improving early warning mechanisms, emphasising the importance of data collection, enhanced monitoring, risk assessment and real-time information sharing in enabling faster public health and law enforcement responses to new psychoactive substances (NPS) and precursors, including pre-precursors and designer precursors.
For more information:
Decision 69/2 - Inclusion of N-desethyl etonitazene in Schedule I of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961 as amended by the 1972 Protocol
Decision 69/3 - Inclusion of MDMB-FUBINACA in Schedule II of the Convention on Psychotropic Substances of 1971
Resolution 69/3 - Strengthening early warning mechanisms consisting of monitoring and assessment systems to enable effective responses to the emergence of new synthetic drugs, new psychoactive substances and precursors, including pre-precursors and designer precursors