Health worker concerned illicit Fentanyl found its way to Bendigo

Tim Townsend, a "mobile drug safety worker" with Bendigo Community Health Service, has a theory that Mexican drug cartels have mixed the drug with more commonly used substances here in Australia in a cynical move to get more people addicted.

The cartels, who make Fentanyl from precursor chemicals obtained from China, lace a lot of methamphetamine with it for the US market, and are increasingly targeting Australia, Townsend says.

In the United States illicit Fentanyl use has developed into a devastating national crisis, with the drug identified as the leading cause of death for Americans aged 18 to 49, according to analysis by the Washington Post.

"Increasingly Mexican cartels are looking to get their product into Australia because we pay such a high price for it. So those smuggling routes have been established through cocaine and methamphetamine.

"My personal theory is that some of this Mexican-in-origin product ended up on the streets of Bendigo."

The outreach worker has heard a lot of stories from clients who bought drugs they believed to be "meth", who, instead of the amphetamine effect they were expecting, found themselves falling asleep.

"For me the anecdotal evidence is overwhelming. I've had six or seven people tell me the exact same story," he said.

"I had one client tell me he was going to Melbourne to score methamphetamine because he wanted stuff that didn't make him go on the nod.

"He said everything that was available in Bendigo [at that time] was going to have a Fentanyl effect. Clients of that subculture were using the word 'Fentanyl'."

The phenomenon had peaked around December 2022, Townsend said.

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The timing correlates with a peak in Fentanyl use in regional Victoria reported by the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission's National Wastewater Drug Monitoring Program last month.

ACIC's 19th report, based on testing conducted in regional areas around the country in December 2022 - although the testing locations aren't revealed - ranked Victoria first among the states in its regional consumption of heroin and second in regional Oxycodone and Fentanyl use.

None of three Bendigo alcohol and drug workers the Advertiser spoke to believed there was a great deal of heroin or Oxycodone use in Bendigo.

But Townsend thinks the presence locally of something resembling illicit Fentanyl should be taken very seriously.

He said its possible appearance in regional Australia had the attention of the Australian Federal Police, peak drug body the Penington Institute, and GP groups tracking drug use.

Generally described as 50 to 100 times stronger than opium, Fentanyl exposes illicit users to greater risk of overdose, as well as addiction, because of its strength and fast acting nature.

"Opiates are way more addictive than methamphetamine," Townsend says. "Someone just has to be taking opiates for a number of days and they start forming a physical dependence on it."

He would like to see simple Fentanyl test kits made available to drug users locally, as he says they have been in Tasmania, through Hobart's Needle and Syringe Program.

"Unless someone dies ... police don't often test the drugs," he says.

"I think most drugs at the moment should be [subject to] a full analysis to see what's actually in there."

Have you or family been affected by drugs laced with fentanyl? We want to hear from you. Contact us at addynews@austcommunitymedia.com.au

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