Zombie drugs Qld: Fears users dying after testing sites closed

There are fears of a zombie drug apocalypse in Queensland, with the shutdown of pill testing sites making it harder to detect.

Generic zombie picture to go with qweekend feature

Clusters of Queenslanders could be dying from overdoses of a deadly zombie drug, experts have warned, but the true toll of the synthetic drug can’t be known without an overhaul of the state’s monitoring system.

And that won’t come from pill testing, with the LNP government staunchly against reopening two sites it shut down in April despite calls from the state’s top doctors and drug experts.

It can also be revealed Queensland recorded its first death from an overdose of the synthetic opioid known as nitazene — which put users into a zombie-like state — around the same time the pill testing sites were shut.

The Loop Australia CEO Cameron Francis, who ran the now-closed pill testing clinic CheQpoint, said the state government was ignoring a very significant threat posed by nitazenes.

Hospital admissions or coronial investigations are the only way to test for the deadly substance without the pill testing sites, and Mr Francis said a more comprehensive overdose monitoring system is needed in Queensland.

Under current monitoring systems people who turn up to hospital unconscious from using a substance would be coded as having an opiod overdose — regardless of the type of opioid they’ve consumed.

This could range from heroin, morphine or nitazenes with no way to properly tell which type it was.

“So we could, right now, be having statewide clusters of nitazene overdose in Queensland, and we would not know about it,” Mr Francis said.

The Loop Australia CEO Cameron Francis

“We’re really behind the eight ball, and if it did come, if we did get that big cluster, it would be a shock to this government.

“If that scenario happened to us in Queensland next week, we would struggle to even know that that’s what’s happened, let alone get a response out fast to the community.”

In Ireland, there were 70 overdoses involving nitazene across two cities over the course of two weeks in 2023.

AMA Queensland president Nick Yim stressed the zombie drug could be found in cheap, unregulated pharmaceuticals sold online, as well as recreational drugs.

Health Minister Tim Nicholls, in a question on notice from Greens MP Michael Berkman, was unable to say how many people had died or presented to hospital from nitazene overdoses because Queensland Health’s existing classification system didn’t track the substance.

Mr Nicholls said there was an interim early warning system, but the government would not provide details on how this would work.

The LNP shut down the pill testing sites as it was adamant there was “no safe way to do drugs” — a position it maintains despite the increasing concerns around nitazenes.

Mr Nicholls, in the question on notice, also confirmed an alert sent out by Queensland Health on March 25 about a nitazene detection was due to a matter currently before the coroner.

A UQ study release in mid-March also revealed nitazenes had been detected in Australian wastewater for the first time, and at higher levels than those of the US, which has been in the grip of an overdose crisis for the last 10 years.

Originally published as Zombie drugs Qld: Fears users dying after testing sites closed