The use of wastewater based epidemiology to detect synthetic opioids in the community

Eastwood and Schlossenberg highlight the need to monitor and respond to the influx of nitazene analogues and other synthetic opioids into the community.1 Their use has increased overdose mortality in the US, while Australia, Europe, and the UK have reported nitazene analogues in drug seizures and toxicological case reports.234Wastewater surveillance is one way to detect their emergence. Wastewater is a valuable information source that has been used to monitor trends in illicit drug use for more than a decade, with programmes currently funded by the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, and New Zealand Police.Additional programmes have incorporated emerging drugs to provide a snapshot of new psychoactive substance use. In the case of synthetic opioids, new methods can detect trace levels down to 0.01 ng/L and around 2 ng/L without sample pre-concentration.56 Despite the high potency and low doses of these new nitazene analogues,…
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