Xylazine, Benzatropine, a hallucinogen and another kind of designer chemical among drugs detected in sample linked to dozens of eastern North Carolina overdoses.
It’s been six weeks since four people died in Goldsboro in four days and more than a dozen others across eastern North Carolina overdosed in a matter of weeks.
Families, community members and law enforcement have been searching for answers about what caused this uptick.
This week, scientists at the UNC Street Drug Analysis Lab were able to provide those. The test results from a sample collected in a baggie show that what was sold as illegal fentanyl was actually a mixture of eight different drugs.
“It turns out it was a particularly nasty mix of substances that involved fentanyl and xylazine, Benzatropine, a hallucinogen and another kind of designer chemical,” said Dr. Nabarun Dasgupta, a senior scientist in the lab. “It was really unexpected so it’s not surprising that a mix like that leads to a lot of overdoses.”
The lab has partnerships with dozens of health organizations, including Edgecombe County EMS. In the weeks since the uptick in overdoses in the county, Dalton Barrett and Dasgupta have formed a friendship as they both work with the common goal to address the crisis in a data-driven, science-led manner.
“This was pretty eye opening for us,” Barrett said. “When I saw the results, there was a number of things that I’d never seen before in Edgecombe County, per se, and it didn’t really make sense as far as the mixture.”
Read more: Drugs sold as fentanyl in Goldsboro, Edgecombe overdoses contained 8 different substancesThis is their second attempt at trying to identify what was in the supply that resulted in 16 nonfatal overdoses in Edgecombe during a two-week span last month. The first sample came from a dollar bill but there wasn’t enough residue for an analysis.
“I was extremely disappointed about the dollar bill sample,” Dalton said. ” I felt like maybe I had done something wrong or we just didn’t get lucky and sometimes that’s just how it goes. But being able to put our finger on this is gonna be a big, big deal for us.”
This time, the sample came from a stamp bag. The street product is known as Pringles.
What’s particularly unsettling: a few months earlier Barrett had samples tested from a different bag that had the same stamp and the results came back vastly different.
“Usually, we try and think about these stamps as like, labels on a beer bottle like this is Michelob Ultra, this is this and it’s like the same thing, time and time again,” Barrett explained. “But that’s not the case.”
Barrett says people in the community likely didn’t know that it was a mixture of so many substances since it had that same stamp and they had been safe using it in the past.
“Even the person selling it probably had no idea that it contained these substances,” Dasgupta said.
With the variety of drugs in the supply, WRAL News asked whether would naloxone work to reverse an overdose. Both men said yes, but the people probably would’ve remained unconscious because of how potent the substance was. It is unclear if xyzlazine testing strips would have worked in this case.
Barrett says they’re unsure if this contaminated supply remains in the area. They’ve seen a 33% drop in overdoses this month compared to last. Still, he says it’s “a big, big deal” they were able to put their finger on what exactly is in supply and he is hopeful the results will raise awareness and save lives.
“Seeing people of my age dying from something that we can prevent really kind of tickles my heartstrings as a medical professional,” Barrett said.