Less than a week after 27 people overdosed on drugs in the Penn North neighborhood of Baltimore, city officials are still working to figure out what exactly caused the incident.
The Mayor’s office is turning to the National Institute of Standards and Technology for help.
NIST’s Rapid Drug Analysis and Research program is taking the lead on analyzing what was in the drugs that caused the mass overdose.
The program was created to trace illicit drug residue samples and analyze them for emerging substances.
Edward Sisco, a research chemist for NIST’s Rapid Drug Analysis and Research program said as soon as they get the sample they can send out a full analysis within 24 to 48 hours.
Sisco said his lab often sees synthetic opioids as the culprit behind overdoses.
“Fentanyl is obviously a big one, and is usually the number one or number two drug we see in terms of prevalence, and you see a couple other fentanyl analogs that pop up, things like Fluorofentanyl and Carfentanil,” he told WYPR.
However, the drugs that are used to cut opioids can be dangerous as well. Dealers use various drugs to limit how much opioids are actually in what they sell to make profit while still trying to create a high. They will use other drugs like Xylazine or Medetomidine, which are used to sedate animals, benzodiazepines like Valium or other things like sugar or caffeine.
Baltimore is still providing outreach to the Penn North Community.
Baltimore officials opened up an outreach center in the Pennsylvania Avenue Library where dozens of people had stopped in to get information and take home harm reduction kits. Community organizations are also offering acupuncture and other stress relieving measures.
Sara Whaley, the city’s director of overdose response, sat in the library with staff.
“Our concentration the first two days was to educate the community, let them know about the event, what happened, and to spread harm reduction messaging around,” she said. “The rest of the weekend we're going to continue to do canvassing, putting out information, spreading harm reduction supplies, Naloxone and test strips and continue to connect folks to resources.”
