DOVER, New Hampshire — A recovering heroin addict said he’s concerned about a new drug from Canada that could be the next front in the region’s battle against opioid addiction.
Labeled W-18, the synthetic opioid was the most powerful in a series of about 30 compounds concocted at the University of Alberta and patented in the U.S. and Canada in 1984, according to a recent article in The Washington Post. From there it remained dormant until it was discovered by Chinese chemists who developed the drug for consumers in search of a cheap and legal high — one expert said that it is 100 times more potent than fentanyl and 10,000 stronger than morphine, the Post said.
Dean Lemire, who works as the regional substance misuse prevention coordinator at Goodwin Community Health in Somersworth, said the potential for a fatal overdose using W-18 is great. The recovering heroin addict said the drug might be so lethal that a rash of overdose deaths could scare people away from it.
“If it starts getting around and people start dropping from it, I don’t think people are going to be flocking to it that much,” Lemire said. “It’s bad PR. Fentanyl is strong enough and that’s out there in force.
“If the word on the street is, ‘If you do W-18, just die’ — and it sounds like it’s that powerful — then why flock to it?” Lemire continued. “People might use it, but it won’t create the kind of market that heroin did.”
The drug has yet to be found in New Hampshire or Maine, although Maine police recently issued a warning about the drug. Police in Sanford told The Associated Press that W-18 appears as a white powder that looks like heroin or fentanyl, but is much stronger.
W-18 is similar to a drug used to tranquilize large animals, such as bears and elephants, and Sanford, Maine, Police Chief Thomas Connolly told the AP that the drug is already present in New England.
Tim Pifer, forensic laboratory director for the New Hampshire State Police, said there are many unanswered questions about W-18, which is not regulated by the federal government.
“It’s never been studied in terms of human interaction,” Pifer said. “Just laboratory rats and mice. It’s extremely potent. But you can order it over the internet and it’s not controlled.”
Despite the warning from the Sanford police, Pifer said he believes W-18 has yet to appear in that state. He believes the closest to New England the drug has appeared is Philadelphia. He also pointed out that W-18 is not “a classic opioid” in terms of its chemical compounds.
“It has had opioid-like reactions in mice and lab rats, based on research,” Pifer said.
Dover Police Lt. Brant Dolleman said the Dover Police Department is concerned about W-18, but its focus is on the opioid epidemic as a whole.
“The public tends to focus on specific drugs, and they’re right to be concerned about those things,” Dolleman said. “But when we’re talking about opioids, our solution is going to be the same — try to find the people who need help and go after those selling it.”
According to the website for Maclean’s, a Canadian weekly news magazine, it’s unclear if naloxone (also known as Narcan), the agent used to reverse fentanyl overdoses, would work against W-18.
Dolleman said opioid addiction sometimes has roots in addiction to legal substances, such as Percocet, Percodan, Tylox and OxyContin.
“Pain management is a huge deal in the medical community,” Dolleman said. “We’ll always see new painkillers. A lot of stuff has roots in legal substances that people get legitimately addicted to.”
Pifer said W-18 is just one of many potentially lethal substances that could emerge as the next battleground in the war against opioid addiction.
“I don’t want to be an alarmist, but there are other compounds just as lethal,” he said. “But citizens need to know that there are dangerous compounds that can show up at any time.”
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