Deaths linked to flesh-eating 'zombie drug' in Britain triple in last year

Xylazine or 'tranq dope' rots the flesh of repeat users leading to horrific wounds, infections and amputations, as well as leaving them unable to stand upright.

The animal tranquilliser - which is also resistant to traditional overdose reversing agents like Naloxone - is used by dealers as a cutting substance to make supplies of cocaine, heroin and fentanyl stretch further.

It's been blamed for further decimating "open air drug market" communities in the US with the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy declaring it an "emerging threat to the nation" and federal agencies reporting the number of overdose deaths it was involved in rose from 102 to 3,468 in the space of just three years between 2018 and 2021.

And now statistics seen by LBC show it was involved in at least 21 drug-related deaths in England and Wales in 2024 - up from seven in 2023, one in 2022 and none until then.

It was also implicated in 20 drug poisoning deaths in Scotland in 2024 - up from 10 in 2023, and none until then.

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Tracey McCann almost lost both her arms to Xylazine during the time she spent suffering from addiction on the streets of Kensington, Philadelphia.

Now three years clean and working at a recovery centre herself she told LBC: "I got into opiates and then it led to heroin, which changed to fentanyl. And then they (dealers) were sneaking the Xylazine into the fentanyl.

"It's an animal tranquilliser and what it does is it stops the oxygen to your tissues. So I would inject it into my arms, be sedated and then I would wake up and they would be black and crusty because the tissue was dying or dead. Someone I knew would sniff it and her nose was like all eaten, you could see into her nose.

"My arms were dying. I was septic and they were almost amputated. I am so grateful that I still have them.

"I was so scared of what it was doing to me. My last day using before I got clean three years ago I was 85 pounds and mentally, physically and spiritually broken. And all detoxes are horrible, but with Xylazine it was like an alcohol, fentanyl and Benzodiazepines detox all at the same time. I was having seizures and it was awful.

"It's very concerning to hear (about the rise in deaths in Britain) because it's not just death there will be so many other things coming with that. You'll have the spiritual deaths and people losing limbs. It absolutely made Kensington even worse. More people just knocked out on the streets. There are so many people that have lost their arms or legs because of it. It makes things even more hopeless."

Outreach workers from nonprofit organisations like the Grace Project now regularly head on to the streets of Kensington to try and help those suffering from Xylazine by providing wound care and distributing supplies like hygiene products, food, and clothing.

Its founder Megan Cohen told LBC officials in Britain should be "very concerned" by the statistics we've obtained showing the drug's increasing impact here.

She said: "It's already there so I would say you guys need to do everything you can now to try to get ahead of it. Because when this progresses it just gets so bad so quickly and then it's really hard to get a handle on it.

"It has made things so much worse in Kensington. It's always been an open air drug market and you've always seen here people dipping out (looking sedated and unable to stand upright) but not to the extent that it is now. I would say Xylazine is what is responsible for it being as widespread as it is.

"On top of that there's people losing limbs or they have craters in their skin, everlasting impacts. That's part of why there's people doing wound care street-side now, because the wounds are just so bad. We see tonnes of people with these wounds just continuing to get worse until they're losing limbs.

"And the detox from it is so bad and it's still so unbearable for people, so we're seeing a lot less people even being willing to go into treatment or they end up leaving treatment once the withdrawal gets so severe. You should be very concerned".

Last September the UK Government announced legislation would be laid before Parliament to ban several synthetic substances including Xylazine, acknowledging its characterisation as "the zombie drug".

It came into force in January meaning they are now controlled as Class C drugs.

Recovering addict Karen in Glasgow though believes they're already doing serious damage on our streets, telling LBC: "I've never known so many people passing away. I've not heard as many (as this) for a long, long time. Because it's all the different drugs that are coming in and people don't know what they are. So they're taking them and their bodies don't take to them.

"It's frightening because I never heard of these drugs and most likely a lot of people maybe haven't heard of any of these drugs either. They've just took them and they've passed away. There's a lot of more people passed away recently and it's scary."

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: "These figures provide a stark reminder of the dangers of drugs and the associated tragic loss of life, which is why we have launched a new campaign to alert young people to the risks.

“This government is committed to cutting the number of drug related deaths through treatment, advice and support and focusing on deprived areas suffering most.”

The Scottish Government's Drugs and Alcohol Minister Maree Todd said: "It (Xylazine) is an emerging threat. I think the work that we are doing across the board is really important. There are some things that we are keen to make progress on, like drug testing facilities...I think that will make a difference.

"We need to remain agile, we need to understand what drugs are out there, what drugs are causing harm, what harm they are causing to individuals, and we need to find ways to prevent that from happening.

"There is no doubt that that will require us to continue our efforts, to work really hard at this challenge and to be agile. You know, five years ago, when we started on the national mission, it was largely heroin. That was the threat that we are facing.

"Nitazines have burst onto the scene and caused a great deal of harm. We're facing a lot of harm from Synthetics across the board. And we need to be aware of that and change our approach accordingly."