DRUG-RELATED DEATHS FALL BUT CRISIS NOT OVER, OFFICIALS SAY

DETROIT -- The number of drug-related deaths in Wayne County has
fallen dramatically since authorities sounded a public health alarm
last month over the illicit use of the painkiller fentanyl, but it's
too early to know whether the crisis has passed, officials said Friday.

Since May 18, there have been 52 suspected drug-related deaths in
Wayne County, county spokeswoman Teresa Blossom said Friday.
Forty-one of those came in the first eight days; this week's numbers
have ranged from zero to two a day, which is in line with the average
for the county.

"It does not mean the crisis has passed or that the concern about
fentanyl in the illegal street drug trade is over," Blossom said.

However, if the lower death rate lasts, "it would be a hopeful sign
that the public education efforts are working," she said.

Fentanyl is suspected to have played a role in many of the 52 deaths,
but that won't be confirmed until toxicology tests are completed.
Those results can take from four to six weeks.

Fentanyl was found in 70 people who died in Wayne County from the
beginning of the year to the middle of April. There were 63 such
cases last year, most of them since September.

Officials in Philadelphia, New Jersey, Delaware and Chicago also have
reported an uptick in fentanyl deaths.

Centers for Disease Control investigators were in Detroit last week
gathering information, but are not expected to issue a report until
later this year, Blossom said.

In most cases, the drug is being mixed with heroin or given in place
of heroin, and users apparently are unaware that they are not taking
pure heroin, officials say. In a few of the Wayne County deaths,
people took fentanyl with cocaine.

The fentanyl being mixed with other drugs is believed to come from an
underground lab. Abuse of pharmaceutical fentanyl, however, has been
around for years.

Wayne State University researchers currently are conducting a study
of a new version of fentanyl that is supposed to be more resistant to
abuse. The study involves giving fentanyl to heroin users for three
weeks, The Detroit News reported. Participants are housed at a clinic
and will be weaned off with methadone at the end, the paper reported.

Dr. Charles Schuster, director of the substance abuse division at
Wayne State's psychiatry department, said he did not know the details
of the fentanyl study, which another doctor in his division is
leading. But he said it is part of a branch of research aimed at
limiting the "abuse potential" of drugs with a legitimate medical use.

Schuster gave the example of the painkiller OxyContin, which
initially was thought to have lower abuse potential because of its slow onset.

"Unfortunately, in the case of OxyContin, all you had to do was to
crush the tablet and it became immediate onset," he said.

Now researchers are turning to other ideas, Schuster said. He
described watching a demonstration recently of a pill that could not
be crushed, even by a coffee grinder, yet would still work in the body.

However, such research can do nothing to solve the problem of
illicitly manufactured versions of drugs, Schuster noted.