Tranq user reveals devastating effects of flesh-eating drug

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To Marjorie Hernandez and Jesse O’Neill

May 15, 2023 | 4:59 PM

As Los Angeles prepares for a “tsunami” of overdoses from cannibal tranquilizers, one addict told the Post about the violent ups and downs of taking animal tranquilizers.

Sean said trunk mixed with fentanyl was a new “introduction” drug in some neighborhoods, but said veterinarians were the first to get access to the powerful pain reliever.

Known as xylazine among chemists, the drug is used to sedate horses and cattle and is not intended for human use.

“I wanted to try something new, but the effect was that I started getting terrible rashes on my back. My skin started to look weird, like it had scales on it,” Sean said. I was.

First called “Trunk” on the streets of Puerto Rico, the “zombie drug” has been found in most US states and is beginning to “saturate street markets” in New York City, prosecutors say.

The ‘roller coaster’ of rising demand stretches west into the streets of Los Angeles and San Francisco, with doctors and police alike on alert.

Tranq slows the user’s heart rate and causes ulcers and skin lesions.

It has been nicknamed the zombie drug because it can degrade and rot skin and muscles when injected.

Medical experts warn that this often results in amputation of the user’s limbs.

Sean, who once overdosed on a mixture of heroin and fentanyl in a Starbucks bathroom and had to come back to life, said why he found the silence appealing.

“Your heart is beating really, really, really, really, really fast. But you can’t do that, you can’t move,” added Sean, who didn’t want her last name published.

“I feel like I’m insane. I don’t want to sound like I’m saying, ‘This is a bomb,’ but when this works in your bloodstream, it does wonders.” It does something to your heart and is painless. It’s like being on a roller coaster and no pain afterwards. ”

A Skid Row resident said the trunk had been mixed with other drugs four times and injected alone.

“Usually it’s like a vial and you put it in like … I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a tranquilizer gun with a big needle. I explained the process and said.

“It hurts when you shoot it. But after a few seconds you feel no pain. You’re outside.”

Sean and others like him are part of a rapidly growing epidemic of emotional abuse in the City of Angeles.

“From 2008 to 2010, it began to invade the Northeast and is now present in 90% of the drug market in Philadelphia, or 25% of the drug market in the New York and Three States area,” said the Los Angeles County Public. said Dr. Siddharth Puri of Health Paramedical Director of Substance Abuse Prevention and Control.

Drug dealers often use xylazine to make heroin and fentanyl euphoria last longer.

“There were four overdoses in San Francisco in February. We know of one death related to trunks in Los Angeles County in 2021,” Dr. Puri added.

Puri said his office is usually months behind in getting information from the coroner’s office when determining what substances are in the body of a deceased person.

“We now need to ensure that the public is educated, that they know their risk factors, and that they know what to do if they suspect that a drug has trunk. I’m in a position, and I think we’re all just anticipating that it could be a tsunami.”

Congress has moved to make Tranq a controlled substance, but the bill has not yet been approved. Meanwhile, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration announced this spring that police officers in 48 states have seized fentanyl-trunk mixtures, which are becoming increasingly common on the streets.

DEA Administrator Ann Milgram has previously warned of the dangers, saying “xylazine makes fentanyl even more dangerous than the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced.” .

Worryingly, Sean sees it becoming much more mainstream.

“It’s like when ecstasy hits. In the beginning, it was just rave-goers that did that. And then it exploded. Then Molly, then fentanyl. And now fentanyl.” It is mixed with other things like trunks.

“It’s not over,” he added.