FLESH-EATING DRUG, “KROKODIL”, SURFACES IN U.S.

By Miriam Raftery

September 26, 2013 (San Diego’s East County) – Arizona officials are reporting the first two cases in the United States of addicts using Krokodil, a drug that rots the skin from the inside out  after first turning skin green and scaly.  It can cause gangrene and amputation of limbs.  A Time investigation of the drug overseas found the average user is dead within 2 or 3 years after first injecting the deadly mixture.

 Krokodil , or Desomorphone, is an opiate. It is cheaper and far more potent than heroin.  It’s been called the world’s most horrifying drug, also known as the zombie apocalypse drug. Illicit drug dealers make it by combining codeine with iodine, gasoline, paint thinner, hydrochloric acid, lighter fluid and red phosphorous which addicts inject.  The drug ruptures blood vessels, causing  flesh to rot and even exposing bone.

Krokodil was first reported in Russia  in 2002. Russia now has over a million or more Krokodil addicts.  The drug has since spread to other European countries and U.S. officials have long worried that it would turn up here.  Now it has.

At the Good Samaritan Poison and Drug Information Center in Bannerk, Arizona, Dr. Frank LoVecchio told CBS news, “We’re extremely frightened.”