Drug Overdose Alert: Deadly Carfentanil Invading The Streets Of Midwest

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration warns the communities to be on alert for carfentanil, which heightens the drug overdoses in the Midwest. This powerful drug is 100 times more potent than fentanyl.

Carfentanil is the drug that is used to tranquilize elephants. It is the same drug that led to the death of the pop star Prince earlier this year. According to NPR News, carfentanil is being sold on American streets and some of the buyers didn't even realize they were buying carfentanil. The drug is mixed with heroin or constrained into pills to look like prescription drugs.

Nearly an ounce of heroin laced with carfentanil was seized by narcotics agents near Cincinnatihttps://t.co/ExdDx2myh3

— NewsChannel 5 (@WEWS) September 2, 2016

Tom Synan, a police chief in Newton, Ohio and who leads the Hamilton County Heroin Coalition Task Force in Southwest Ohio said that instead of having four or five overdoses in a day, they're having these 20, 30, 40, maybe even 50 overdoses in a day. He also said that there was an overwhelming number of carfentanil overdoses in Cincinnati in July.

Meanwhile, in Ohio, Hamilton County Health Commissioner Tim Ingram explained that it takes hours for the body to metabolize carfentanil, which means that this drug is a longer-lasting high. When someone overdoses on the said drug, they are difficult to revive and save their lives.

"We've been getting lots of reports that they're using two or three doses to get people to come back," says Ingram. He's trying to apply a stronger version of naloxone.

Carfentanil is also referred to as synthetic opioid analgesic fentanyl. It is about 10,000 times more potent than morphine, which makes it the most potent commercially used opioids. It is also marketed with a trade name Wildnil, which is used as an anesthetic agent for big animals. Its side effects include nausea, itching and serious respiratory depression, which is life-threatening.