'We could get 20 deaths tomorrow': The new super-strong drug causing panic in Piccadilly Gardens

Experts in Manchester are bracing themselves for the arrival of a super-strength street drug that can be hundreds of times more potent than heroin. Synthetic opioids called nitazenes have been linked to more than 100 deaths across the UK since last summer.

There are not thought to have been any nitazene-linked deaths in Greater Manchester. But one heroin user, who spoke to the Manchester Evening News anonymously, said he believed it was already in circulation in the city and feared he had inadvertently taken it recently.

"It's in town now, " he said. "People 'round the gardens [Piccadilly Gardens] are worried about it because you can't tell until you've had it.

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"It's horrible. It makes your heart start beating too fast. You feel sick. You feel like you're overdosing straight away. It's too strong."

Last month the government classified 15 types of nitazenes as Class A drugs, with the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs warning they are highly addictive and pose a greater risk of overdose.

Speaking at the time Home Secretary James Cleverly said: "We are highly alert to the threat from synthetic drugs and have been taking a range of preventative action, learning from experiences around the globe, to keep these vile drugs off our streets. Placing these toxic drugs under the strictest controls sends a clear message that the consequences for peddling them will be severe."

Nitazene was first developed in the 1950s, but never approved for sale. Its re-emergence has been put down to China's crackdown on fentanyl, a synthetic opioid estimated to have caused 75,000 deaths in the US in 2022, and problems with heroin supplies caused by the Taliban's ban on harvesting opium poppies in Afghanistan.

In December it