Medicines bought from online retailers as genuine prescriptions can be packed with synthetic opioids, linked to hundreds of deaths across the country since they first hit the black market around 2019. In the period from August 2023 to September 2024, seven drugs from the North East were tested by emerging drug experts at WEDINOS, and found to be fake medicines filled with synthetic opioids. In Barnard Castle, an unsuspecting consumer bought medicine labelled as diazepam, a prescription drug used to treat anxiety, muscle spasms and seizures from a shady online store.
But when the drugs, convincingly wrapped in blister packs like those found in a pharmacy, were tested by scientists, they were found to predominantly contain metonitazene. In a similar fashion, 'oxycodone' pills bought over the internet by someone in Darlington, turned out to be contaminated with isotonitazene. Metonitazene and isontonitazene are both part of the nitazene group - a family of super-strength synthetic opioids that will be categorised as Class A drugs under new government plans.
Nitazenes are stronger than heroin and fentanyl, a prolific killer in the US. Records show that the influx of new synthetic opioid drugs has been linked to 278 deaths in the UK in the last year - three of which were in the North East. Durham MP Mary Kelly Foy said she was "hugely concerned" that fake medicines brimming with synthetic opioids had been discovered in the region.
The National Crime Agency believes nitazenes are b.