Heroin
This is a representational image. DEA/Handout via Reuters

A new powerful drug is causing chaos in the U.S. As presented in Primera Hora, the illegal narcotic, more potent than heroin, is distributed in the form of patches, pills, powder, absorbent paper and aerosol.

According to the director of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), Suzanne Roig Fuentes they will redouble efforts to guide people about the dangerousness of the drug. "At present, we have not identified in our Treatment Services participants who have reported Fentanyl consumption. However, we recognize that most of the drugs circulating in the United States tend to eventually reach Puerto Rico. Faced with this possibility and taking into account the findings of the DEA, an educational campaign was launched," Roig Fuentes wrote in a statement.

As part of the efforts, at the SAMHSA facilities, a clinical staff will begin distributing informational material on drug-related harm among communities, added Roig Fuentes. She also explained that Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid similar to morphine, but with much more powerful effects, and in its legal form, it is a medicine prescribed by doctors to relieve severe pain.

The drug Fentanyl, is circulating illegally on the streets in the United States causing deaths from overdoses, "is produced in clandestine laboratories and mixed with heroin or cocaine, which increases their levels of potency and danger," said Roig Fuentes.

Fentanyl's most common side effects include diarrhea, nausea, constipation, dry mouth, somnolence, confusion, weakness, sweating, and less frequently abdominal pain, headache, fatigue, anorexia and weight loss, dizziness, nervousness, hallucinations, anxiety, depression, flu-like symptoms, indigestion, shortness of breath, hypoventilation, apnea, and urinary retention.

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