Since the beginning of 2016, the North Reading Police Department has seen a change in the drug trend in town. We still have a heroin epidemic in the Commonwealth but we have seen a shift in North Reading towards Oxycodone 30 milligram prescriptions pills, commonly called Perc 30s or just Percs, and the very dangerous drug Fentanyl. Parents should understand that Oxycodone 30 milligram prescriptions pills are still an opiate and once a person becomes tolerant of this “high”, the next shift unfortunately is to the more potent drug Heroin.
Parents and loved ones are urged to seek treatment for someone abusing Oxycodone pills as soon as possible to prevent the introduction to heroin and or Fentanyl. These treatment resources are available on the CIT website as well as NRPD.ORG
The most common ways a person can abuse Oxycodone/Percocet is:
- Orally
- Snorting- crushing the pill and snorting its powdered form
- Smoking- smoking the pill from a piece of tinfoil by burning the pill underneath the tinfoil
The other alarming trend we are seeing more of is the presence of Fentanyl in North Reading. Several presumptive drug tests of powder that we have seized in 2016 is showing a positive reading for Fentanyl. Unfortunately people are assuming they are purchasing heroin but are in fact buying Fentanyl or heroin laced with Fentanyl. Fentanyl is over 100 times more potent than heroin and is linked to several Massachusetts deadly overdoses. People should be aware that Fentanyl is being sold to look like heroin and therefore an addict is unaware that they are abusing this deadly drug.
Below are some pictures of items related to drug use that should help parents. Anyone with questions are encouraged to call Det. Tom Hatch at 978-357-5067 or can email him at thatch@nrpd.org