On the trail of a new street drug
Inside Health
BBC
4.4 • 575 Ratings
🗓️ 15 August 2023
⏱️ 30 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What happens when a new drug hits the UK’s streets? And how are illicit drugs here changing – and why?
James follows the trail of the first case of “zombie drug” xylazine in the UK and hears some powerful personal stories along the way.
The story begins in Solihull, in the West Midlands, where 43-year-old Karl Warburton was found dead in May 2022. He had a mix of xylazine, heroin, fentanyl and cocaine in his body.
James visits a local addiction clinic where Mark describes the fear and compulsion many addicts face. He tells James about his journey to recovery and we meet Simon who’s on a mission to help people like Mark into a new life.
Next, James meets toxicologists at a busy hospital lab in Birmingham where he finds out how xylazine was first detected. Then he travels to London to meet a university academic who first raised the alarm about the drug, and visits a cramped room containing the paper records she keeps detailing every drug death in Britain from the past 25 years.
James goes on a surprising and, at times, emotional journey as he gets a rare insight into the world of illegal drugs and the parts of the NHS that treat addiction.
Presenter: James Gallagher Producer: Gerry Holt Editor: Erika Wright Production Co-ordinator: Jonathan Harris Technical producer: Andrew Garratt Locations: Solihull Integrated Addiction Services, Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust Department of Toxicology, Birmingham Heartlands Hospital The National Programme on Substance Abuse Deaths (NPSAD), King’s College London
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, I'm Greg Jenna and good news, Your Dead to Me is back for a new series. Here we go. Yes, we'll explore Emperor Nero's notorious reign with Professor Marybeard and Patton Oswald. I would not want my daughter having the remote control, not alone an empire. We'll dissect the decadent life of Philippe Duke-Dor-Leon with Tom Allen. I've often tried to pretend I'm an aristocrat and being very quickly knocked down. |
| 0:23.0 | And there'll be so much more with comedians like Olga Koch, Mike Mosniak and Rihalina. |
| 0:26.9 | I'm excited. |
| 0:27.6 | You're dead to me. |
| 0:28.5 | The comedy podcast that takes history seriously. |
| 0:30.9 | Listen first on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:34.4 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:39.1 | Hello there, and welcome to the Inside Health podcast with me, James Gallagher. |
| 0:43.9 | Do you always know what's in the drugs that you're taking? |
| 0:48.0 | Not at all. When you're doing that stuff, you act inside, you just carry on talking it. |
| 0:52.4 | You don't think about what's in the stuff. |
| 0:54.1 | You're playing a Russian roulette with your life and yeah. |
| 1:00.0 | Hello there and welcome to inside health. |
| 1:05.0 | Today we're getting a rare insight into the world of illegal drugs and the parts of the NHS that have to face that reality |
| 1:12.7 | and treat addiction. We're also on the trail of a new street drug called xylazine. Now, you may have |
| 1:19.4 | seen headlines describing it as the flesh-eating zombie drug or reports of the huge problems |
| 1:25.3 | that xylazine being mixed with illegal drugs has been causing in the United States. |
| 1:30.3 | Or maybe of the first death here in the UK, Carl Warburton's body was found containing a mix of xylasein, heroin, fentanyl and other drugs. |
| 1:40.7 | He lived in Solihull in the West Midlands and that's where we start our journey. |
| 1:48.0 | So I've come now to Solihull Integrated Addiction Services |
| 1:52.0 | and it's just on a quiet housing estate, |
| 1:56.0 | it might as well be a GP surgery for all you can tell, but let's head in. |
... |
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