Tablets used to treat Parkinson’s disease have being packaged as Xanax sedatives and smuggled into the Republic for sale on the black market, the director general of Forensic Science Ireland (FSI) has said.
Chris Enright told The Irish Times that in recent months there had been four major seizures of counterfeit Xanax. Each involved tens of thousands of tablets packaged as Xanax but were instead tablets used to treat Parkinson’s disease, hayfever and nausea.
“The most recent seizure was 40,000 tablets. It is very concerning and this is relatively recent,” he said, though he added it was unclear who the target market was for the counterfeit Xanax tablets.
“Is it people who are looking for a cheaper form of the drug and they think they are getting what they need cheaper? Or is it people who are looking to abuse [the drug]?”
He added it was a matter of real concern that people who believed they were taking a sedative were in fact consuming a drug with a completely different active ingredient and they were unaware of this.
Source: Conor Lally, The Irish Times, 9th April 2019
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