A new ‘zombie’ street drug that may be more deadly than fentanyl and xylazine is causing overdoses across the United States.
Medetomidine, a powerful animal tranquilizer used in dogs and cats, is He is believed to be behind a series of drug overdose deaths in chicago this month and appears in drug supplies in eight other states.
The sedative is mixed with fentanyl and other illegal drugs to create deadly cocktails, similar to another drug known as xylazine that began showing up in illicit supplies during the Covid pandemic.
But officials say it is even more “potent” than xylazine and could cause many of the same shocking side effects, including leaving users in a zombified state.
Green states show where medetomidine has emerged, including California, Colorado, Missouri, Illinois, Florida and North Carolina. The yellow circles represent where overdose outbreaks have occurred, such as Chicago.
The DEA says xylazine has already been detected in 48 of 50 US states. A study published in December involving 60,000 drug tests on adults in the US showed that xylazine was detected in samples from most states (pictured above).
Five milligrams of the drug. costs about $43, which was developed by Orion Pharmacy and distributed by Pfizer.
Medetomidine is often combined with other drugs such as fentanyl because when mixed with opioids, it greatly increases the sedative effects of each drug, which may be perceived by drug users and dealers as a better or stronger product.
The drug has been most frequently observed in samples containing fentanyl and xylazine, but has also been identified along with heroin and cocaine, the Center for Forensic Science Research and Education said.
Animal studies of the drug have shown that it initially lowers blood pressure and slows heart rate, increasing the risk of a heartbeat abnormality.
In some cases, when the dose is high, it can slow your heart rate so much that it can no longer pump enough blood, causing heart failure, sudden cardiac arrest, or sudden death.
Because medetomidine is not an opioid, it does not respond to naloxone or Narcan, the most common brand of opioid reversal medication.
However, officials recommend using naloxone if someone is suspected of having overdosed because medetomidine is almost always used along with opioids.
A homeless man is seen on the streets of the Kensington neighborhood as homelessness and drug addiction hit Philadelphia in Pennsylvania in 2021.
Medetomidine can cause serious effects such as hallucinations and sedation.
The drug also slows the body’s neurological functions, causing confusion and lethargy, as well as opioid overdose symptoms such as shallow breathing and small pupils.
Medetomidine, a powerful animal tranquilizer used on dogs and cats, is believed to be behind a series of drug overdose deaths in Chicago.
The drug is artificial and its effects are believed to last longer than xylazine.
Another form of the drug, with the trade names Dexdor or Precedex, is used in human medicine for sedation and muscle relaxation.
Medetomidine was detected in several drug samples seized in Maryland in July 2022, meaning it could come from abroad. It later resurfaced in Toronto in December 2023.
It has been detected in overdoses in St Louis, Missouri, and appeared in the US illegal drug supply in Philadelphia in April and in Pittsburgh earlier this month.
The substance has also been found in seizures from secret laboratories in Ohio, Florida and Canada.
In Indianapolis, Indiana, health officials warned that the drug is now in local supplies.
Bertha Madras, a Harvard Medical School drug researcher at McLean Hospital, said NPR He worries that Mexican cartels and drug gangs inside the United States are making new combinations of powerful synthetic drugs.
Until the overdoses between May 11 and 14, when drug samples tested positive for high levels of medetomidine, Chicago health officials said medetomidine had not previously been detected in the state.
In Chicago, officials said the drugs tested contained other opioid and non-opioid sedatives, including fentanyl, heroin, xylazine, alprazolam and netizens.
The effects of medetomidine may be intensified when taken with other sedatives.
In March 2023, the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) sounded the alarm about xylazine, another animal sedative that is also not approved for human use.
Commonly known as “tranq,” the drug is used by traffickers as a cheap cutting agent that enhances the effects of fentanyl and other illegal drugs, giving the impression that the drugs are stronger than they are.
But its powerful sedative effects turn its users into zombies, causing painful sores as the drug destroys blood vessels, requiring amputation in extreme cases.
Recent data from the CDC showed that the number of fatal overdoses in the United States decreased last year.
There were about 107,500 deaths in the year to December 2023, the agency estimates, down three percent from 2022, when there were about 111,000.
Explanations could be the expansion of overdose prevention and addiction treatment and the grim possibility that the epidemic has killed so many people that there are now basically fewer people to kill.