HSE to form group to tackle rise in drug overdoses linked to synthetic opiates
Ie Dublin The Leah Green Service Overdose Over Rollingnews Recent Farrell/© A In Health Executive Photo: College Warning Sign Problems
The HSE is to establish a new red alert group to tackle the mounting numbers of drug overdoses linked to synthetic opiates which threatens to spread nationwide.
It is also urgently telling emergency services and hospitals to stock up on additional doses of naxalone to treat synthetic opioid overdose presentations and be ready for outbreaks to spread nationally.
Already there have been 74 overdoses in Cork and Dublin blamed on nitazenes — heroin alternatives which are 25 times more potent than fentanyl, itself a much-feared synthetic opioid that has caused death and destruction in North America.
While the overdoses in Cork and Dublin have so far been non-fatal, in Britain there have been at least 54 deaths in the past six months linked to nitazenes.
The HSE has said the results of toxicology tests on all drug users who died in both Cork and Dublin over the last two months are being assessed to determine if any of the deaths are linked to the lethal drug.
The national red alert group, NRAG, being co-ordinated by the HSE National Clinical Lead for Addiction Services, will monitor cases of concern and will also be expected to spearhead a rapid response to any future overdose outbreaks. It is made up of health, crime, and academic experts.
Sources in Limerick city say that inter-agency meetings are already taking place there in preparation for a spike in overdoses such as occurred in Dublin and Cork.
The HSE says that while only the heroin market in Ireland is impacted by the emergence of nitazenes, “of concern is the emergence of these substances being sold as falsified tablets in the UK (mainly as benzodiazepines and oxycodone)".
International drug cartels are already using legitimately qualified chemists to produce more and more heroin alternatives and senior security sources say nitazene in particular is "hugely concerning".
While a man has appeared in court in recent days and allegedly confessed to gardaí he was responsible for recent overdoses in Cork, it is thought to be very difficult for law enforcement here to try and source where the nitazene supplies in Dublin and Cork came from.
Gardaí suspect those dealers who brought it into the country “probably believed” it was heroin. They say Irish heroin traffickers have been examining over the last two years alternative supplies if the Taliban succeeds in closing down opium production in Afghanistan.
The militant group has already destroyed around 85% of production in Afghanistan.
“There are heroin stocks there, but if the Taliban keep up their eradication programme eventually the heroin stocks will dry out," a source said.