Up to part of the fentanyl offered on Philly’s streets comprises an commercial chemical utilized in plastics production. That’s in step with our November 2024 checking out of fentanyl samples accumulated in Philadelphia’s Kensington community, thought to be the most important open-air drug marketplace at the East Coast.
What’s extra, the volume, or focus, of this commercial chemical within the drug samples incessantly exceeded the volume of fentanyl.
We’re an epidemiologist and anthropologist whose analysis makes a speciality of substance use issues and the opioid overdose epidemic. Our crew’s findings have been printed within the peer-reviewed Magazine of the American Scientific Affiliation in February 2025.
The commercial chemical we discovered is named BTMPS, which is the average abbreviation for bis(2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-4-piperidyl) sebacate. BTMPS belongs to a category of molecules known as hindered amine gentle stabilizers that producers continuously upload to plastics and different polymers to offer protection to in opposition to degradation from warmth and daylight.
Since March 2024, our crew has examined 228 side road fentanyl samples accumulated in Kensington. Of those, 39 – or 17% – contained BTMPS.
We first detected BTMPS in Philadelphia in June 2024. We discovered it in two of the 8 samples – 25% – that we accumulated that month. By means of November 2024, 12 of twenty-two samples – or 55% – contained BTMPS.
Why BTMPS is being added to the road opioid provide, and at what degree in manufacturing or distribution it’s being added, stays unknown.
Researchers suspect that it can be added to stabilize a fentanyl precursor chemical this is prone to degradation from warmth and oxygen.
Given its low price, BTMPS will also be added to dilute different psychoactive ingredients or costlier elements or each.
Kensington Street in North Philadelphia is thought of as the epicenter of the town’s opioid disaster.
Spencer Platt by way of Getty Pictures
How poisonous is BTMPS?
A few of the 39 samples that contained BTMPS in Philadelphia, the typical quantity of BTMPS used to be just about double that of fentanyl. On moderate, BTMPS made up 4% of the pattern, whilst fentanyl made up 2.3% of the pattern. In a single pattern examined, BTMPS made up 18% of the pattern.
BTMPS has now not been authorized for human intake or been studied in people.
Alternatively, it’s been proven in rat research to cut back nicotine use and attenuate withdrawal signs related to morphine and cocaine.
The rat research printed a number of adversarial well being results from publicity to BTMPS. They come with middle defects, severe eye harm and demise.
Those findings elevate issues concerning the expanding publicity of BTMPS to people thru side road medicine. The concentrations as much as 18% discovered within the Philly samples are many orders of magnitude upper than the estimated focus of 0.1% to 0.5% that individuals are uncovered to thru plastic merchandise.
One of the vital side road fentanyl samples from Philadelphia contained extra BTMPS than fentanyl.
Joe Lamberti for The Washington Publish by way of Getty Pictures
BTMPS showing in fentanyl throughout the United States
Our colleagues who’re checking out side road opioid samples in different areas additionally detected BTMPS in fentanyl samples or paraphernalia residue in Delaware, Maryland, Nevada, Washington and California. In Los Angeles, BTMPS used to be first detected in July 2024 – through September, 56% of samples there contained it.
The unexpected and nearly simultaneous look of a brand new adulterant in U.S. side road opioids from the East Coast to the West Coast is unusual. For instance, fentanyl, xylazine and medetomidine was prevalent within the U.S. opioid provide in numerous areas at other instances.
The hot emergence of BTMPS in side road opioid markets national means that it can be getting into the provision at an early degree in manufacturing or wholesale distribution.
Traditionally, Philadelphia’s side road opioid provide has had robust ties to Puerto Rico. Those ties influenced Philly’s early incorporation of the veterinary sedative xylazine into the road drug provide. Since 2021, xylazine has been found in nearly all of Philly’s side road fentanyl.
Given those associations, we also are checking out the road opioid provide in Puerto Rico to inspect possible similarities and relationships with Philadelphia’s provide. Up to now, we’ve got detected BTMPS in two out of 49 – or 4% – of side road opioid samples in Puerto Rico. We first detected it in a pattern in September 2024 and once more in December 2024.
What’s subsequent
We proceed to watch BTMPS developments in Philadelphia’s side road fentanyl. We also are analyzing whether or not concentrations of fentanyl and different key compounds equivalent to xylazine in Philly’s side road fentanyl have modified as new adulterants equivalent to BTMPS and medetomidine develop into extra fashionable – and whether or not those adjustments play a task within the declining overdose demise fee in Pennsylvania and different portions of the U.S.
We also are growing plans to check the instant and long-term results that BTMPS publicity has on folks the use of medicine.
