Health Alert: Injectable Liquid Fentanyl

 

The fentanyl crisis continues to be a very real concern. Fentanyl misuse typically involves injecting or smoking illicitly-manufactured fentanyl (IMG) sold on the street as counterfeit tablets or powders. Experts warm about recent theft of injectable pharmaceutical fentanyl in liquid form from hospitals, clinics, and medical supply houses in Panama, the United States, and Europe. Injectable solutions have also been reported in Nigeria, Columbia, El Salvador, Argentina, Brazil, and Costa Rica - countries that do not currently have a major illicit opioid problem.

Illicitly-manufactured fentanyl liquid solutions pose similar lethal dosing dangers to counterfeit pills and powders. Drug traffickers often mix the solution with xylazine, cocaine, and other fentanyl compounds to sell more product and generate larger profits. When mixed, drug dosage rates can vary leading to higher overdose death rates and lethal outbreaks.  

Officials are concerned that this could have severe implications for the introduction of fentanyl into drug markets in places that have not yet been exposed to illicit opioid use as well as worsen the existing fentanyl crisis in the United States.

Alert:  https://www.cfsre.org/nps-discovery/public-alerts/colombo-plan-health-alert-injectable-liquid-fentanyl#:~:text=Public%20safety%20and%20public%20health,an%20existing%20fentanyl%20epidemic%20worse.