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Police warn about heroin cut with powerful tranquillisers

Police detectives have issued a warning that heroin is currently being cut with a substance that makes it 10,000 times stronger than regular street heroin.

The warning follows tests carried out on drugs recovered by police officers while they were investigating six fatalities in Yorkshire. The drugs they found had been contaminated with a strong painkiller called fentanyl, and a tranquilliser used for animals, called carfentanyl. The police said that fentanyl is 100 times more potent than street heroin and carfentanyl is 200 times more potent.

There have been four fatalities in Barnsley, South Yorkshire, one in Leeds, and another in Normanton, West Yorkshire. Last month, Cleveland Police issued a warning once they had connected these deaths to a single batch of low-grade heroin from Stockton on Tees. Enquiries are still ongoing, as the police attempt to establish the cause of these six fatalities.

The contamination with the tranquillisers was discovered when West Yorkshire police carried out tests on different batches of the drugs recovered throughout Yorkshire and Teeside. Detective Chief Inspector, Jim Dunkerley, said users of drugs in the Yorkshire and Teeside areas should exercise extreme caution when buying their supplies.

Common symptoms of an overdose of fentanyl include difficulty breathing, slow breathing, a feeling of nausea, as well as vomiting, dizziness, and an increase in blood pressure, Mr Dunkerley said. Only last year, the world-renowned pop star, known as Prince died by overdosing on fentanyl.

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