Advertisement

We need your help now

Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.

You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.

If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.

File photo Shutterstock/Todorean-Gabriel

Ireland 'needs to be ready' for increase in fentanyl use amid expected heroin shortage

Concerns have also been raised about xylazine, a powerful sedative typically used in animal surgeries.

IRELAND NEEDS TO prepare itself for an increase in the use of fentanyl and other powerful drugs if there is a heroin shortage next year, the head of an addiction charity has warned.

A heroin shortage is expected across Europe in 2024 following a ban on poppy cultivation by the Taliban in Afghanistan. The vast majority of heroin consumed in Europe – about 95% – comes from Afghanistan.

Tony Duffin, CEO at Ana Liffey Drug Project, which provides harm reduction services to drug users and their families, said Ireland needs to prepare itself for an increase in the use of fentanyl or other highly addictive drugs.

In an interview with The Journal, Duffin said “something is going to happen” and Ireland needs to be ready.

“The opium crop is being destroyed by the Taliban in Afghanistan, meaning that something is going to happen. If you destroy 95% of Europe’s supply, then something has to happen, and we need to be ready.

“Fentanyl could be the issue. It could be xylazine which is another drug that they certainly have seen in the UK more recently which isn’t an opiate, which Naloxone won’t work with, but it is part of the overdose deaths problem in the US.”

Naloxone, which is widely accessible in Ireland, is a prescription medication used to temporarily reverse the effects of opioid drugs such as heroin, fentanyl and methadone.

Xylazine is a powerful sedative typically used in animal surgeries; naloxone cannot reverse its effects.

Duffin said relevant stakeholders in Ireland “need to really closely monitor what’s going on”.

“We need to speak to people about what’s going on, monitor what’s going on in terms of overdose deaths, look for new trends, test drugs – all these things that we do some of, but we need to do more of.”

Duffin said there is already “great collaboration” between groups like Ana Liffey and the HSE, An Garda Síochána and the Probation Service, “but there’s always more that can be done”.

“Ana Liffey is one agency. If you’re looking at it from a macro perspective, from a Government perspective, it’s about all of the agencies increasingly working together.”

cluj-napocaromania-10242019xylazininjectablesolution File photo of Xylazin Shutterstock / Todorean-Gabriel Shutterstock / Todorean-Gabriel / Todorean-Gabriel

The Journal recently reported that the HSE, gardaí and other organisations are working behind the scenes in preparation for fentanyl use becoming more prevalent in Ireland.

Last year the Taliban banned poppy cultivation but the 2022 crop was exempted, meaning the effect of the ban likely won’t be felt in Europe until next year.

Fentanyl is a powerful synthetic opioid that is about 50 times more potent than heroin and up to 100 times more potent than morphine. The drug is not currently widely used in Ireland but experts fear its use could become more widespread if there is a heroin shortage.

There are two types of fentanyl: pharmaceutical fentanyl and illegally made fentanyl. The former is prescribed widely as pain relief medication in the US.

Fentanyl and xylazine can both be injected, snorted, smoked, or taken orally via a pill. Tens of thousands of people in the US have died from fentanyl overdoses.

Overdose deaths involving xylazine are less common, but concerns over the drug have increased in recent years.

In countries such as the US, it is not uncommon for street drugs to be laced with fentanyl or xylazine without the user realising what they are consuming.

Earlier this year, the first death related to xylazine was reported in the UK.

Citizens’ Assembly

The Ana Liffey Drug Project yesterday launched its Strategic Plan for 2024 to 2029.

Duffin said the plan is “a commitment to those we serve and those we collaborate with”.

“We’re refining our identity, enhancing our systems, and putting our service users at the forefront of everything we do,” he added.

The Citizens’ Assembly on Drug Use last month recommended that the State should take a comprehensive health-led policy response to dealing with people who are in possession of drugs for personal use, rather than a criminal approach.

The assembly vote on the approach to dealing with people found in possession of cannabis was the tightest – 39 people opted for a health-led approach on the final count, and 38 opted for legalisation and regulation.

Duffin said the assembly’s recommendations are “very progressive” but also “achievable”.

If the recommendations are accepted by the Government, Duffin said “the true test will be in their implementation”

This will require political will, adequate funding, stakeholder engagement, and continuous evaluation and adaptation.

Duffin noted that drug use is “a contentious issue”, but said previous assemblies on other controversial topics have “worked well”.

“It would be unfortunate if the Government didn’t take the recommendations on board, and implement at least some of them,” he said.

Duffin noted that other jurisdictions have regulated and controlled cannabis “in many different ways”.

“Ireland needs to consider what it’s going to do in the future. I don’t think it’s going to happen anytime soon.

But 10 years from now – when other jurisdictions have had different experiences and different evidence to show us – maybe we will.

Speaking at the launch, Hildegarde Naughton, Minister of State with responsibility for the National Drugs Strategy, said the Citizens’ Assembly on Drug Use was “a really, really pivotal moment for us”.

“This is the first time that we’ve truly had an open and honest conversation about drug use, and how it impacts on the wellbeing of people directly affected by substance abuse issues, but also their loved ones, their communities and society as a whole.

“And this is a long overdue conversation that is happening at the moment.”

Naughton said the Government will consider all of the assembly’s recommendations in detail.

She thanked Ana Liffey for its work on the frontline, saying its strategic plan is based on “extensive community involvement” and incorporates feedback from service users.

“The strategy is reflective of the voice of that community through its renewed focus on outreach, low-threshold interventions, advocacy, research and trends,” she added.

Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone...
A mix of advertising and supporting contributions helps keep paywalls away from valuable information like this article. Over 5,000 readers like you have already stepped up and support us with a monthly payment or a once-off donation.

Close
35 Comments
This is YOUR comments community. Stay civil, stay constructive, stay on topic. Please familiarise yourself with our comments policy here before taking part.
Leave a Comment
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute De Wit
    Favourite De Wit
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:04 PM

    Russia tried to warn the west they were backing the wrong horse, they didn’t listen…

    87
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute amos brearly
    Favourite amos brearly
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:10 PM

    And what is the UN doing? Nothing, just like they watched Yugoslavia go into meltdown.

    83
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute William Boyd
    Favourite William Boyd
    Report
    Jan 2nd 2015, 2:11 AM

    When a religion is involved particularly Islam, evil will out, even simple brain movements are swamped by brainwashing

    5
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Bertie
    Favourite Bertie
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:17 PM

    All because the USA armed, trained and funded rebels who wanted to overthrow the democratically elected government. Good old Murikka.

    56
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Avina Laaf
    Favourite Avina Laaf
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:54 PM

    Whatever else about the clusterfvck that is present-day Syria, don’t be under the illusion that Assad was ever democratically elected.

    48
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute x
    Favourite x
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:05 PM

    Democratically elected? Assad has been in power for 15 years and his father 29 years before that both winning rigged/unopposed elections

    42
    See 16 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ben Murphy
    Favourite Ben Murphy
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:09 PM

    That was his point.

    5
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Avina Laaf
    Favourite Avina Laaf
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:12 PM

    Ben, open elections haven’t been held in Syria for over 40 years. All candidates in any so-called elections have to be pre-approved by the regime – hardly what anyone would call democratic.

    24
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Declan Noonan
    Favourite Declan Noonan
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:20 PM

    Bertie, would you like to talk about the uprising that assads father brutally put down in 1982? This is the same situation over again.

    19
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Frank
    Favourite Frank
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:25 PM

    Avina Laaf_ Assad ( like Saddam Hussein) protected vulnerable ancient Christian settlements from US backed head hackers.

    20
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Horgay H
    Favourite Horgay H
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:28 PM

    Re Avina

    Brush up on your history. Elections were held recently enough in Syria. I believe it was over a year ago at this stage.

    Also, don’t forget NATO’s own polls a few months back put support for Assad at at least 70% of the population and even up to 85/90%.

    Syria could not have fought off the proxy invasion of its country by Saudi Arabia/Qatar/Turkey/UK/France/US etc without the full support of its population, which it has had. It was very telling early in the conflict and middle that whenever the ‘rebels’ entered an area and took it over the civilian population fled en masse. Whenever the ‘rebels’ were defeated the civilian population returned.

    Besides, we cannot talk of democracy and elections. On the ladder of democracies, ours surely must be on the bottom. Elections every couple of years, very low vote turnout and then our elected representatives go off and give their full support to the likes of the FSA at the start of the Syrian invasion. The FSA has said from the outset that Syria would become an Islamic state with Sharia law if it ever succeeded with its invasion. I do not want my dim-witted elected representatives supporting the likes of that.

    18
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Horgay H
    Favourite Horgay H
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:31 PM

    Re Declan.

    You haven’t a leg to stand on. You fervently support the US on nearly every issue yet how many democratically ejected governments has the US toppled because they didn’t suit it’s geopolitical desires. The answer. Countless. Give William Blum a read.

    17
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Frank
    Favourite Frank
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:34 PM

    Bassar Al Assad must be commended for single handily taking on the evil proxy terrorist forces of the West.

    http://s10.postimg.org/sw3ji1zmh/assad_1.jpg

    17
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Horgay H
    Favourite Horgay H
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:37 PM

    Re Frank

    I agree. He is a modern day hero to the people of Syria. I admire his stern belief on his duty to protect his country.

    12
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Avina Laaf
    Favourite Avina Laaf
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:37 PM

    Frank, would you like to comment on Saddam Hussein’s treatment of the Kurds or the Marsh Arabs? Or maybe Assad senior’s treatment of the civilians of Hama?

    15
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Avina Laaf
    Favourite Avina Laaf
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:44 PM

    Horgay, funnily enough civilians tend to flee conflict zones whenever possible, and return when peace returns – nothing odd or telling about that. Regular journal readers will know you have your own take on events in Syria (to which you’re perfectly entitled of course). Most others who have been following this conflict from the very early stages (before your loathed ‘mainstream media’ even began to take an interest in fact) realise that the reality is much more complex than your version however.

    11
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Avina Laaf
    Favourite Avina Laaf
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:49 PM

    Horgay, please tell me how indiscriminately dropping barrel bombs on built-up areas packed full of innocent civilians is ‘protecting’ his people? The fact that you find these sorts of actions worthy of admiration is nauseating.

    13
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Frank
    Favourite Frank
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:52 PM

    Avina Laaf_ The combined slaughter caused on the Kurds. Marsh Arabs and Civilians of Hama would dwarf that of what the United States has caused in the Middle East.

    What makes matters more unbearable is that these ongoing atrocities are carried out by proxy terrorists armed and trained by the US. Example would be those schoolchildren blasted to pieces last October by “moderate” rebels.

    This shows up the true yellow bellied nature of the United States Government,

    11
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Avina Laaf
    Favourite Avina Laaf
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 9:00 PM

    Even if what you say is true Frank, surely you can’t say that one justifies the other, or in your mind are christian lives worth more than other lives??

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Horgay H
    Favourite Horgay H
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 9:03 PM

    Re Avina

    I have been commenting on the Syrian conflict since its inception, but under a different guise. And I tell you what, the majority of what I said was ridiculed by you and others when I said the West was arming and training foreign Islamic jihadists in Turkey and sending them into Syria to cause mayhem and destabilise the country.

    You have gotten Syria competition wrong. I guess it hurts when the recent ex US Ambassador to Turkey mucks up and says exactly that.

    11
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Kustin J Crush
    Favourite Kustin J Crush
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 9:40 PM

    @ Horgay/Frank…. sure Aasad is a lovely chappie, take some more of the meds . ( and no! Some of the other mob are as bad if not worse!…… mind you you won’t hear much condemnation from our chatting classes (no Israelis involved, don’t you know!!!!)

    5
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Frank
    Favourite Frank
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 10:37 PM

    Kustin J Crush_ At least Bassar Assad doesn’t cheer lead a nation that slaughters 500+ defenseless children.

    5
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute KeiKe
    Favourite KeiKe
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:41 PM

    The representations of the UN in the Team America movie….still pretty accurate

    14
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Horgay H
    Favourite Horgay H
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:15 PM

    The article is a fine piece of propaganda and a further attempt to frame the narrative of the story.

    For all those out there who do not follow world affairs then you need to know the following.

    The conflict did not give rise to Islamic groups, Islamic groups were sent into Syria from Turkey from the outset after being armed and trained by the West there. They then proceeded to attack Syrian state forces and begun an ethnic cleansing of areas they began to control, eliminating thousands upon thousands of Christians and other groups. They proceeded to wreck civilian infrastructure, cut communications and killed government employees from postmen to nurses en masse. This was all done with the full knowledge of the moral West. Innocent civilians would not get in the way if geopolitical goals. The ‘uprising’ ( http://thebricspost.com/an-eyewitness-to-the-syrian-rebellion-father-frans-in-his-own-words/#.VKWqYnanw0M) began a few days after a gas pipe deal was signed which was not favourable to Qatar.

    Don’t let the media in the West frame your views on world affairs. We, in the West, have a lot of blood on our hands. We elect these maniac, evil politicians who have let these crimes be committed.

    The summary of the Syrian conflict cannot be whitewashed. The media has covered up the meddlings of the West so many times from Rwanda to Iraq to Libya to, now Ukraine and Syria.

    10
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Declan Noonan
    Favourite Declan Noonan
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:21 PM

    Horgay, no blood on my hands! Don’t think that you speak for anyone but your deluded self.

    9
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Horgay H
    Favourite Horgay H
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 8:35 PM

    Re Declan

    If you have voted for either the Democrats or Republicans then I am afraid there is. And plenty of it. They are two sides of the same coin, giving the illusion of choice.

    The foreign policy if the US has been directly responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of innocent mem, women and children. This cannot be dispute by any sane person. It still does. Look at the Congo, look at what the US help perpetrate in Rwanda with the genocide there that was the result of American meddling.

    9
    See 3 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Petr Tarasov
    Favourite Petr Tarasov
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 10:31 PM

    Ah there’s Deco again, defending the indefensible.

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Declan Noonan
    Favourite Declan Noonan
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 10:37 PM

    Petr, can you please tell me what I’m defending? How did you get “defending the indefensible” from my comment? Or are you taking my quote that I have used on Horgay? This is the guy who has defended dictators around the world. Surely you have noticed that. Or are you in bed with the likes of Horgay, Frank and others?

    4
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Frank
    Favourite Frank
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 11:06 PM

    Declan Noonan_ You are very confused of who you defend.

    Yesterday you admitted that you don’t support Syrian Moderate Rebels.

    Yet the regime that you constantly defend openly supports moderate Syrian Rebels.

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Charles Mcdonald
    Favourite Charles Mcdonald
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:43 PM

    Almost 9 an hour.

    7
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Charles Mcdonald
    Favourite Charles Mcdonald
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:47 PM

    Or look at it this way by the time you read the article and comment there is another woman raped strangled or hanged. Maybe another man shot in face or head hacked off.

    I’m sure the Un will issue another very strongly worded letter and maybe have a meeting about having a meeting

    15
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Wasna Matkaw
    Favourite Wasna Matkaw
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:52 PM

    Let them get on with it.

    5
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Petr Tarasov
    Favourite Petr Tarasov
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 9:47 PM

    A disgusting comment.

    7
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Charles Mcdonald
    Favourite Charles Mcdonald
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 10:29 PM

    Truely horrible. Of this 9 an hour how many are children? I don’t know but I really don’t think 9 soldiers or militants. Talking about innocent men women and children. There was a video few weeks ago I think was on here showing a girl being condemned to stoning by her father. Another months ago of garroting women. Truely vile. Now let’s not be silly it’s not all assad there is war crimes on both sides.

    Arming moderates well who dedides who is a moderate ?? Throwing arms at these people invites trouble. If people rise up and it’s a good cause fine give them a fighting chance but not if their cause involves evil extremists

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Windom Earle
    Favourite Windom Earle
    Report
    Jan 1st 2015, 7:28 PM

    Not 200,000 as they reported past time

    2
Submit a report
Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
Thank you for the feedback
Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.

Leave a commentcancel