Trace residue identification, characterization, and longitudinal monitoring of the novel synthetic opioid ß-U10, from discarded drug paraphernalia.
Drug Test Anal
; 14(9): 1576-1586, 2022 Sep.
Artigo
em Inglês
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2219689
ABSTRACT
Empirical data regarding dynamic alterations in illicit drug supply markets in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, including the potential for introduction of novel drug substances and/or increased poly-drug combination use at the "street" level, that is, directly proximal to the point of consumption, are currently lacking. Here, a high-throughput strategy employing ambient ionization-mass spectrometry is described for the trace residue identification, characterization, and longitudinal monitoring of illicit drug substances found within >6,600 discarded drug paraphernalia (DDP) samples collected during a pilot study of an early warning system for illicit drug use in Melbourne, Australia from August 2020 to February 2021, while significant COVID-19 lockdown conditions were imposed. The utility of this approach is demonstrated for the de novo identification and structural characterization of ß-U10, a previously unreported naphthamide analog within the "U-series" of synthetic opioid drugs, including differentiation from its α-U10 isomer without need for sample preparation or chromatographic separation prior to analysis. Notably, ß-U10 was observed with 23 other drug substances, most commonly in temporally distinct clusters with heroin, etizolam, and diphenhydramine, and in a total of 182 different poly-drug combinations. Longitudinal monitoring of the number and weekly "average signal intensity" (ASI) values of identified substances, developed here as a semi-quantitative proxy indicator of changes in availability, relative purity and compositions of street level drug samples, revealed that increases in the number of identifications and ASI for ß-U10 and etizolam coincided with a 50% decrease in the number of positive detections and an order of magnitude decrease in the ASI for heroin.
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Texto completo:
Disponível
Coleções:
Bases de dados internacionais
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Drogas Ilícitas
/
Transtornos Relacionados ao Uso de Substâncias
/
COVID-19
Tipo de estudo:
Estudo observacional
/
Estudo prognóstico
Limite:
Humanos
Idioma:
Inglês
Revista:
Drug Test Anal
Assunto da revista:
Farmacologia
Ano de publicação:
2022
Tipo de documento:
Artigo
País de afiliação:
Dta.3284
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