Common drugs being laced with deadly potent synthetics

Harm-reduction advocates are calling for new measures to combat a rise in deadly synthetic drugs. Video via AAP.

Transcript

00:00Nitrazines are like nothing we've seen before in Australia. These can be 500

00:06times stronger than heroin and just two milligrams, an almost invisible speck, can

00:13be enough to cause fatalities. Nitrazines have been found mixed in with

00:19all sorts of other drugs from MDMA to heroin to cannabis products and

00:24disposable vapes. This puts hundreds of thousands of people in New South Wales

00:30at risk of harm. With the arrival of nitrazines in the New South Wales drug

00:36supply, the calls for drug checking are more and more urgent. Drug checking is

00:45now a matter of life or death in New South Wales. It's incredibly important

00:52that we recognise this is an opportunity for a reset to protect the community.

00:58The first step in terms of life-saving, that was a life-saving form, it's a life-saving method.

01:03It's actually, it can change from you stop breathing to you breathing within 30 seconds.

01:22you