AUDIO – IT’S HAPPENED BEFORE –
Sept. 14, 2023 – Another group of people who are affected are people intending to use stimulants on their own but who don’t realize their supply has been laced with or contaminated with potent drugs like fentanyl.
“The drug supply is so toxic and dangerous, so if somebody’s using cocaine on the weekends here and there and they get the wrong batch, they could die of an overdose as well,” Weintraub said.
Making sense of autopsy data
While taking both of the drugs at the same time is potentially lethal, it’s important to note that just because a person has both stimulants and opioids in their bloodstream, it doesn’t mean they died from the combination.
Autopsy toxicology reports, which the Addiction study is based on, are not a perfect science.
“What they do is just provide us a list of substances that a person may have used, it doesn’t tell us when they used it and doesn’t tell us if they were consumed at the same time,” said Zachary Kosinski, the director of harm reduction at the Behavioral Health System Baltimore. “The sources usually do a pretty poor job of telling us what caused the overdose.”
