Fentanyl, the zombie drug, has come closer to Croatia. Cases of fatal overdoses have been recorded in Slovenia, and the reason for concern is that it is an extremely strong opiate that is easily put on the black market, which the MUP, which closely cooperates with the American DEA, is aware of.
All of Europe is in great fear of the spread of fentanyl and its derivatives on the black market. We are talking about an opiate known to the public as the “zombie drug” that has flooded the USA and whose devastating effect kills approximately 100,000 addicts in that country every year.
Fentanyl made its way to the streets from medical institutions where it is legally used to relieve pain in patients with advanced stages of malignant diseases. Its action is similar to morphine, but it is approximately one hundred times stronger. Therefore, heroin addicts most often reach for it “on the street”.
Of particular concern is that even one consumption can turn a person into a serious addict, and a very small amount can lead to cardiac arrest. It is enough for a certain number of people to order fentanyl online, which, due to unprofessional handling, especially by children and minors, will lead to poisoning and death due to lung failure by inhaling dust from an open postal envelope, experts warn.
Dealers recognized in it an advantage over other so-called hard drugs in that it can be produced in improvised laboratories, that is, it does not need to be imported like heroin from Afghanistan. In addition, it has a stronger effect than heroin, is cheaper and easier to smuggle. Dealers often send it to their customers by mail, i.e. in letters. All of the above causes huge headaches for the police, which in the US, but also in the wider world, deal with the suppression of the opiate trade.
Until now, Croatia has successfully resisted its appearance among domestic dealers and addicts. According to the MUP data presented to Hina, the presence of fentanyl or its derivatives has been identified in four cases so far. They met him for the first time in 2017 during the seizure of a letter sent from China, which, according to the Croatian Institute for Public Health (HZZO), was identified as one of the global sources of this extremely powerful opiate and its derivatives.
In the biological sample of the deceased, it was found in 2019, 2022, and 2023. The Ministry of Internal Affairs notes that death in those three cases did not occur due to fentanyl overdose. It was about treated drug addicts where death was a consequence of poor health, caused by drug addiction or by poisoning with painkillers or a combination of all of the above.
No cases of fentanyl procurement, production or overdose have yet been recorded in Croatia
Cases of its purchase through social networks, the so-called dark web or illegal production have not been recorded in our country so far. Fentanyl overdoses have also not been recorded in Croatia, but this does not mean that its threat should be taken lightly, the MUP points out.
In 2021, 137 deaths caused by “zombie drug” overdoses were recorded in the European Union. With 88 deaths in the same year, Germany was far ahead of other EU countries. In neighboring Slovenia, two cases of consumption with fatal consequences were recorded, according to HZZO data.
The very fact that fentanyl abuse started to die in our neighboring country, with which we share the free flow of people and goods, is a call for increased police and customs action in combating this global threat.
From July 2023, Croatia, through the police, is part of the global coalition fighting against synthetic drugs, i.e. fentanyl. The drug crime service of the Police Directorate cooperates with the US federal agency for the fight against drugs DEA at the highest operational and strategic level. The MUP points out that they are well aware that the fight against organized drug crime cannot be waged only locally or regionally, but globally.
It was the DEA that evaluated the Croatian police as the main regional partner in the international fight against transnational drug crime, and it has its regional office here, the MUP points out.
In previous years, the Croatian police and partners have conducted more than 70 criminal investigations aimed at international drug smuggling through postal traffic, which were mostly paid for in crypto currency. Those investigations resulted in the arrest of the persons involved, the seizure of drugs and the collected evidence for the successful conduct of criminal proceedings in all police departments. According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, this is a good experience and preparation of tactics and working methods in the future, in the case of a global threat such as fentanyl, since it is extremely dangerous even with unprofessional handling, Hina news agency writes.
