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Expert's warning over drug 15 times STRONGER than heroin about to hit Irish streets
09:42, 12 OCT 2015
BY CONOR GALLAGHER
Similar to heroin and morphine, acetyl-fentanyl is believed to be the cause of several clusters of overdose deaths
Acetyl-fentanyl is a designer drug, similar to heroin and morphine, which first came to the attention of authorities in 2014 after it resulted in several clusters of overdose deaths.
Having originated in the US, it has since claimed lives across Europe and was identified by a Welsh coroner in Cardiff last May as the primary cause of the death of a father of three who had bought it online from China.
Dr Tom Hannigan, the director of chemical sciences at Ireland's forensic science laboratory, revealed the lab has received a warning about the substance from the EU drug monitoring system.
He said: “We recently received a warning of this compound which is a newly-derived, very powerful synthetic opioid which has been associated with deaths in other EU countries but we haven't yet seen
it in this country.”
Dr Hannigan told the Annual National Prosecutors Conference on Saturday the alert came from the European Monitoring System for Drugs and Drug Addiction.
It operates an early-warning system for new synthetic substances detected in the EU.
He added: “We send reports of any new materials we encounter to them and they send reports to us
of materials encountered in other countries.”
The legal status of acetyl-fentanyl – also known as tango, jackpot and Apache – is unclear in most jurisdictions because it is so new.
In the UK and US it is technically legal as long as it's not sold as being fit for human consumption.
It is also available for purchase online from several sources.
Its legal status in Ireland has not yet been tested although it will likely come under the Psychoactive Substances Act 2010 once it is detected.
The drug has no recognised medical use. A report in The Annals of Emergency Medicine said acetyl-fentanyl is dangerous because it is being mixed with or substituted for heroin.
Users may think they are taking a normal dose of heroin when in fact they are consuming something that is between five and 15 times more lethal.
An overdose appears similar to a heroin overdose, causing emergency doctors to administer a normal amount of naloxone, an antidote which can reverse the effects of an overdose if administered in time.
But regular doses of naloxone will have little effect on an acetyl-fentanyl overdose.
Dr Hannigan said the advent of so many new types of psychoactive drugs in recent years has been “a major challenge” for Forensic Science Ireland which is responsible for analysing illicit substances seized by gardai.
He added: “These are new materials made by ingenious chemists, made by tweaking existing illicit substances, making some small change, adding something or taking out something.
“They can have unpredictable effects because they haven't been used before. They're dangerous for that reason.”
Source : http://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-ne … 15-6617258
Catégorie : Research Chemicals - 27 octobre 2015 à 20:06
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