I have never been one of those people that understood the allure of ingesting poison into my body for the promise that I would feel really good for a moment or two. I mean, when you really think about it, you have to feel almost sorry for some drug addicts for their blatant ignorance. Especially these days, when there is so much information on how absolutely horrible some of this stuff can be.
The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) is concerned about a cheap, flesh-rotting horse tranquilizer that is flooding the illegal drug market in the United States.
Mass-produced in China, the drug xylazine—also known as “tranq”—has recently become very common on the streets of San Francisco, Philadelphia, and New York.
The “zombie drug” can reduce a person’s pulse rate and respiration until they cease, leaving users catatonic or dead, and it can create skin lesions that look like flesh is being chewed off, sometimes down to the bone.
Drug traffickers frequently combine Xylazine with fentanyl to extend the high, a potentially lethal concoction, but “tranq” is also frequently combined with other substances like meth and cocaine.
The DEA said Xylazine is making an already deadly drug crisis even more dangerous.
“Xylazine is making the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced, fentanyl, even deadlier,” said DEA Administrator Anne Milgram in a public safety alert.
Xylazine and fentanyl mixes have been found by the DEA in 48 states, according to Milgram.
About 23% of the fentanyl powder and 7% of the fentanyl tablets that the DEA confiscated in 2022 contained xylazine.
When fentanyl is coupled with “tranq,” users are at an increased risk of deadly overdosing, according to the DEA.
“People who inject drug mixtures containing xylazine also can develop severe wounds, including necrosis—the rotting of human tissue—that may lead to amputation,” the DEA said.
The number of fentanyl deaths involving xylazine increased from 2.9% to 10.9% each month in 20 states and the District of Columbia between January 2019 and June 2022, according to a report released in June by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Since xylazine is not an opioid, Narcan, the emergency opioid-reversing medication, does not function on “tranq”. The DEA continues to advise giving Narcan to someone who has overdosed, just in case they have taken more drugs.
According to the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) November warning to medical practitioners concerning xylazine, routine toxicology tests also fail to find xylazine.
“Xylazine is not safe for use in humans and may result in serious and life-threatening side effects that appear to be similar to those commonly associated with opioid use, making it difficult to distinguish opioid overdoses from xylazine exposure,” the FDA said.
Although some states have established limitations, “Tranq” is presently not a nationally restricted substance, making it easier to purchase than illegal substances like heroin.
Bipartisan legislation to classify xylazine as a Schedule III narcotic under the Controlled Substances Act was first filed in Congress earlier this year, but it has not yet been passed.
Ohio made the independent decision to initiate legal action against “tranq.”
Governor Mike DeWine, a Republican, signed an executive order designating xylazine as a Schedule III controlled narcotic in March.
Major cities are attempting to deal with the problem of “tranq” on their streets on both the East and West coasts.
Recently, “Tranq” reportedly traveled through New York City’s streets at “astonishing” speeds.
At a news conference this week, San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria discussed the risks associated with xylazine use in public.
“If it is anything like fentanyl, just a few years ago we only had a handful of fentanyl overdose cases and now we have hundreds. We hope that we don’t have something similar with tranq,” Gloria said.
Things that make you go hmmm.
They’ll go out of their way to stop the distribution and discussion of ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine, but twiddle their thumbs about fentanyl and simply be “alarmed” by people abusing flesh-rotting horse tranquilizers.
Thomas Cooper