As Death Toll Continues To Climb In Sacramento, Fentanyl Turns Up In Bay Area
Law enforcement officials investigating the source of the pills will be looking to see whether the Sacramento and Bay Area cases are connected.
The Associated Press:
14 People Fatally Overdose On 'Painkiller' In California
Fourteen people in the Sacramento, California, area have fatally overdosed on a pill disguised as a popular painkiller, and now the drug has turned up in the San Francisco Bay Area. Bay Area hospitals have treated seven patients who ingested what they thought was the painkiller Norco in recent weeks, according to a report released Tuesday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The patients all survived, though at least some experienced nausea, vomiting and difficulty breathing. (4/26)
California Healthline:
Counterfeit Opioid Poisonings Spread To Bay Area
An outbreak of poisonings linked to a counterfeit prescription painkiller — previously seen in the Sacramento region — has reached the Bay Area, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. The CDC reported Tuesday that seven patients were treated for overdoses in Bay Area hospitals in late March and early April after taking what they thought were tablets of Norco, a brand-name painkiller that combines acetaminophen and hydrocodone. (Feder Ostrov, 4/27)
In other news related to the opioid crisis —
The Washington Post:
This New Street Drug Is 10,000 Times More Toxic Than Morphine, And Now It’s Showing Up In Canada And The U.S.
It was first developed in a Canadian lab more than three decades ago, promising and potent — and intended to relieve pain in a less addictive way. Labeled W-18, the synthetic opioid was the most powerful in a series of about 30 compounds concocted at the University of Alberta and patented in the U.S. and Canada in 1984. But no pharmaceutical company would pick it up, so on a shelf the recipe sat, the research chronicled in medical journals but never put to use. The compound was largely forgotten. Then a Chinese chemist found it, and in labs halfway around the world started developing the drug for consumers in search of a cheap and legal high — one experts say is 100 times more potent than fentanyl and 10,000 stronger than morphine. (Mettler, 4/27)