down by about ten degrees. and on the west coast, a rain system stretching from northern california to washington will soak the region through wednesday. >> all right, we'll see you back here at the top of the hour. "sanjay gupta md" starts right now. >> on the program today, you're going to see an incredible brain operation while the patient is awake, but why she's having this operation is even more incredible. plus, mike rowe is going to stop by later in the show. first, there is a new threat to teenagers, a new type of drug you may have never heard of but are being marketed to your kids as harmless. and the truth is, as you might guess, is that they are anything but harmless. senior investigative correspondent drew griffin is here with a really important story to tell. >> and it's a story, sanjay, that the parents of two dead teenagers really want to be told, because they themselves had no idea what happened to their children. these new drugs are called synthetics, chemically produced, designer drugs, designed to

evade the law, sold online, easy to get. and before anyone knew what they were dealing with, these drugs tore through a midwestern city, ruining dozens of lives. in the week of june 10th, 2012, law enforcement in grand forks were dealing with an outbreak of violent overdoses, a mystery drug on the streets had already killed two teenagers. >> we've got multiple overdoses. we've got two young men that have lost their lives. i mean, what's more serious than that? >> reporter: tim purden is the u.s. attorney for north dakota. >> that was unprecedented. i've been u.s. attorney now going on four years. this is the only time we've reached out to a school system, to the university, and said, hey, there's this danger on the streets right now that people need to be aware about. >> reporter: as the emergency warnings were being issued, investigators were desperately trying to find out just what this drug was, and more importantly, where it came from. >> it took lab analysis to determine the true nature of these substances. when we learned what they were,

2ccmbone, that was new to us. >> 2ccoemb are synthetic designer drugs, chemicals designed to imitate the high of the banned drug lsd. these drugs are so potent, a dose the size of a few grains of salt is enough to get high. north dakota's top federal drug prosecutor had never heard of them, and neither had christian burke's parents. >> i had to go to the internet and look up information on it. and i really didn't understand the whole synthetic drug. i didn't know what it was, didn't know how dangerous they were. >> the message we got after we went on the internet was that somebody had said it was okay for these drugs to be on the street, and they had been tweaked. but that's all we knew. >> reporter: synthetic lsd has been blamed for at least --

>> parents across the country are now learning the painful truth about synthetic designer drugs. >> investigators say he overdosed on a synthetic marijuana -- >> otherwise known as k-2. >> reporter: with deaths and overdoses reported almost daily. >> poisons a 15-year-old girl. >> 16-year-old -- >> life bankruabruptly ended at 18 years old. >> these drugs are being marketed and sold as legal alternatives to marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine, lsd and heroin. >> reporter: in the last four years, more than 300 synthetic designer drugs with names like spice, n-bomb and bath salts have flooded into the united states. even the popular club drug molly, which is marketed as a pure form of the drug ecstasy, is being replaced by a variety of synthetic compounds. according to dea scientists, the highs may be the same, but the molecular structure is modified just enough to evade the law.

>> you know, andrew griffin joins us again now. you look at these drugs, and it's interesting, the kids in that picture, it totally changes your perception of the whole drug industry. i think people hear people taking illicit drugs and it conjures up an image in their mind of who people are that are doing this, engaging in this sort of behavior. these kids had these drugs marketed to them, you said. what does that mean? they're living in this neighborhood, they obviously have good parents. how does one market a drug to kids like that? >> you put it in a little wrapper. you put it in a little cellophane wrapper, put a nice, shiny label on it, call it something like bubble gum or spice or put a cartoon figure on it and the kid gets the wrapper and it's all sealed up like it comes from a company, sanjay. they believe it's safe. they can get it over the internet. it comes in the mail. that's how it's being marketed. >> they know it's a hao lu hallucinogenic. but they know it's a drug, they believe it won't kill them.

>> they shouldn't believe that, because on every package, it says "not for human consumption." that's the little catch-all phrase manufacturers use to evade the law. >> and protect themselves. >> exactly. >> the dealer, who is this person? we see the picture of the kids. >> this is what is most scary, i think, about this entire story. the dealer was a drug entrepreneur. he was a middle-aged man with a family, a swing set in the backyard, suburban home. and from his internet computer, set up a boutique drug industry. he even registered with the state of texas and paid his taxes. he thought he was legitimate, ordering in these chemicals that are mostly made in china now. they're mostly made in china. they'd come over, he divvies them up and he was selling them to all 50 states. i shudder to say this for the dea's sake -- anybody could do this, sanjay. that's how scary this is. >> i hope people see this and watch this and are reminded of it. so, shouldn't do drugs.

>> that's the message, really. >> that's the message, but obviously, just what's in this stuff? what are you about to put in your body? do you really know? and the answer's often you don't. thanks, as always. really appreciate it. you're going to want to stick around for this next story. it's about a brain operation performed while the patient was still awake. we'll take you straight into the operation room and show you what happened. i'll preface by saying remarks are nothing short of remarkable.

since deep brain stimulation was first approved for tremors in 1997, more than 100,000 patients have had them

implanted. at the success of deep brain stimulation or dbs in helping patients return to normal lives has been pretty overwhelming, but that hasn't been the case with tourette's syndrome, until now. ♪ when i find myself in times of trouble, mother mary comes to me ♪ >> i love to sing. singing is what gets me through a lot of hard days. ♪ whisper words of wisdom let it be ♪ >> when i'm on the computer, when i'm driving, when i write poetry, basically, anything with a sense of focus. i used to play in a pool league. when i shoot pool, i don't tick. you'll see me completely at ease when i'm doing those things, because i'm in my comfort zone and i'm not really caring about anything else.

i don't have to worry about my ticks. i do just that, i worry about my ticks. >> amber comfort is 25 years old. she suffers from tourette's syndrome. it's a neurological disorder that usually starts at a young age. >> i don't remember any parts of ever being tick-free. so, i was 5 when the symptoms started happening, 6 when i was diagnosed, and there's not a day that's gone by that i don't remember moving or making noise and i couldn't help it. it's been lovely. sitting in class, second grade, teachers would put me outside the hallway because i'd be ticking so loud, i was a distraction. so, teachers would walk by me back and forth and say, you'd better stop that before you get into my class next year, you know, things that were just completely obscene that you would never expect the world to be, but i had to deal with it on a daily basis. >> okay, deep breath. >> after years of unsuccessful therapies and only limited results from her medications,

amber was referred to dr. oken at the center for movement disorders. >> turn around again for me? okay. what we are planning on doing in your case is putting a lead down into grand central station on each side, but also, there's going to be a lead on top of your brain, sitting on the surface of your brain. >> dr. oken and dr. foote have chosen amber for an experimental dbs surgery. they will implant a new grid-like device on top of her brain in addition to the standard leads, which go deep inside the brain. by combining both, they hope to gather information from amber's brain that will not only lessen heriti ticks, but maybe some da stop them. >> so, the difference in tourette is the movement disorder isn't there all the time. you know when you get a tick, it comes on. and the patients that have ticks, they get this build-up. they call it a premonitory urge.

that's what the scientists call it. and they fell that they need to move, and until they move, they don't feel better, and so, they get a sense of relief. >> between the two block, okay? >> and so, in the tick brain, there's a relationship between what we call the motor behavior, so the movement, and the lindic behavior, okay? and that's the actual systems in the brain that are encoding values for emotion. >> that sensation, the urge to tick, is what amber suffers from every day. >> it's like having 15,000 mosquito bites that you can't itch. you can't itch it. and they come out and you have no control, and you cannot take them away. >> one of the most scientif scientifically exciting things about deep brain stimulation is that it offers the really

uncommon opportunity to record the electrical activity from a living human being's brain. >> it's the cutting edge of what is known as neural network modulation. through their extensive work with parkinson's and other movement disorders, the doctors are honing in on a particular area deep in the brain known as the becauasel ganglia. it's an area that can control both movement and motion. i've been invited to observe amber's groundbreaking surgery. i'll be joining a team of doctors flying in from around the world for this unique chance to listen to the brain and to learn from it. hey matt, what's up?

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you can do it. >> put your elbow in. >> first i'm going to size it up, see how it fits. >> ouch, ouch, ouch. >> the day of amber's brain surgery has finally arrived. after a lifetime of living with the debilitating effects of tourette's syndrome, she and her family are hoping today's operation can finally provide some relief. >> there she is. the guest of honor. >> so, probably should put a pillow. >> do you understand everything that's being done today? >> yes. >> okay. how are you feeling about it? >> as good as i can be. >> okay. you get to stay awake through the whole thing. >> yeah, i heard. >> you just watch the internal capsule and watch the internal boundaries of the structures,

you can see. so, that is what we think is a safe trajectory to get there. >> they expect the operation to last at least 12 hours. >> actually, it's negative 12. >> negative 12? >> before any incision is made, the entire surgery is mapped out virtually. >> so, what i'm about to do is not painful at all, okay. it's not a painful procedure. it's just really loud. all right, here we go. >> to begin, four holes are drilled into her skull. >> one down. so, you're now a member of an elite club. very few people can say they've had a hole drilled in their skull while they're awake. >> dr. foote and his team have performed more than 1,000 deep brain stimulation procedures, but the additional contacts they are placing on top of amber's brain are new and still being tested. >> so, we said left courtical first, right? >> we want to split the contact so that we have got some over the premotor region, so we can

sense the ticks before they happen when they get premonitory urges. >> what's interesting is when you're thinking about tourette's, you're thinking about something that is almost half motor movements and almost half emotion. when you look at what they're actually going right in the middle. you have motor on one side, emotion on the other. look at that line. that goes right down the middle of both. >> to make sure they found the right locations, they stimulate the leads on amber's motor cortext. that involuntary twitch is a good thing. next they are lowered into place to capture deep activity. >> what we're listening to now is three channels.

like an orchestra, like an ensemble. >> they drive the probes deeper and deeper, listening as the krels talk to him. >> all three channels are up. a buster out of the posterior channel. >> they are telling him the best place to implant the remaining leads. >> when you hear that crisp sound, that means you're close. it's total blow your mind kind of stuff because we have no idea until we get in there and start to look at the data. >> let's go ahead and -- don't suppress your tics. let them come. >> can you see when she has tics, she has activity deep in her brain, not just the superficial areas. take a look over here. >> with the new lead successfully implanted on ton

and inside amber's brain, the doctors have essentially created a new network. it's an early version of what they hope will some day become a tic detector. >> so, we're recording from 16 different locations in her brain right now. >> and what you're describing really hasn't been done before. >> right. but we're also trying to figure out what causes this. so, in some ways she's sacrificing for kids in the future who have tourettes. >> we did check in with amber this week, who was at the university of florida for her second checkup since the operation. the way she puts it, she says she has about 30% fewer vocal tics and doctors are continuing to take new reportedings from her brain. amber's dad says he hopes they put the device on happy. up next, an idea maybe so

preposterous we need to explain it. safety third. what's going on here? will that be all, sir?

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but do you consistently get it? you do with comcast business. and often even more. it's reliable. just like kung pao fish. thank you, ping. reliably fast internet starts at $89.95 a month. comcast business. built for business. when i was up in new york the week of mike rowe's show premiere. one thing we talked about was this idea of safety third. in some ways it's an idea that's so crazy, you have to stop and think about it for a minute. >> no, you made up safety third in an attempt to start a conversation, tweet people a little bit, because the -- the safety first way of thinking is,

perhaps, the most well intended goal, but if you really think it through, it's got some flaws. first of all, safety is never first. if it were, we would wrap ourselves in bubble pack and stay home and drive rubber cars at speeds approaching 5 miles an hour. life is about managing risks. it's not about making safety the prime directive. it's about being safe as often as you can. but the safety first culture, and with great respect, you know, a lot of the protocols you'll read in osha and a lot of other well-intended manuals that mandate very, very specific adhesion, these things over time create, in my view, a kind of complacency that's counterintuitive. so, when you're forced to sit through a compulsory meeting and forced to do a lot of things under the guise that somebody

else cares more about my safety than i do, then you abdicate a certain measure of responsibility. you become complacent and you get hurt. first four years of "dirty jobs" no injuries on the crew. last four years, all of us, i mean -- >> really? >> nothing serious, but broken fingers and toes and stitches and all kind of things went sideways. we took our eye off the ball. >> you think it was complacency? you go to the pharmacy, you pick up medications, you buy food at the grocery store, drink water out of a drinking fountain. in this country you expect those things to be safe. >> yes, yes. >> that's part of our way of life. the quality of life. is that part -- do we by abdicating responsibility, is that making us more risk-takers? what's the -- is that what happened with your crew? did they take more risks as a result of this complacency?

>> yes, right. i'm certainly not an expert on this but i read a paper years ago that i thought was interesting that talked about homeostatic risks. it was a theory about risk ee quul lib yum. you have a tolerance for risk and i have a tolerance for risk. statistically speaking, they're not the same. but as we begin to employ certain safety protocols, we will counterintuitively begin to assume greater levels of risk. therefore, you ride a motorcycle, you put on a helmet, you're going to drive a little faster. you drive a cab and somebody puts in an automatic braking system. they did this study in munich years ago. it was fascinating. they monitored the whole fleet of cabs and the drivers took more chances, cornered more sharply, got in more accidents. so the most dangerous intersections in the world are the ones that have signs that tell you when to walk because they train you not to look for the car. you are trained to look for the

little guy. it's a controversial theory but enough truth in it because i've seen it in my own life. >> pretty good advice from a great guy with a terrific show. don't miss the season finale of "somebody's gotta do it" wednesday only here on cnn. n"new day sunday" continues right now. randi kaye and victor blackwell. new details this morning of the dangerous and risky mission to rescue american hostage luke somers. special force commandos under the cover of darkness and an urgent deadline to free somers. breaking overnight. protester violence in berkeley, california.