A second man has died after being supplied with an “unusually strong batch” of heroin circulating in north Devon.
One man died after taking the substance on Friday and police confirmed a second man, who had earlier been admitted to hospital, died late on Saturday.
A total of 10 people, including the second man who died, were taken to hospital for treatment, two of whom remain there. Devon and Cornwall police said they believed the people had used some of the same batch across Westward Ho!, Bideford and Barnstaple.
Two men and two women arrested on suspicion of being involved in the supply of a controlled substance have been released on police bail pending further inquiries.
Emergency services declared a major incident on Friday evening after police became aware at about 5pm that the batch was circulating in the area. The alert was withdrawn on Saturday morning, with police saying the issue was believed to have been “contained”.
The north and west Devon local police area commander, Supt Toby Davies, said: “As soon as we were made aware of the issue this substance was likely to cause on Friday evening, we did everything possible with partners to reach out to the drug-using community to warn them of the potential danger they were facing.
“We continue to work with health partners to warn those who may be substance users to exercise extreme caution. However, we would reassure the community we believe this is now contained.
“If anyone fears they are in danger or are in the company of someone suffering a medical episode, we would ask they contact 999 to seek appropriate medical help.”
André Gomes, the communications lead at Release, the UK’s national centre of expertise on drugs and drug law, said: “We’ve been concerned with the increasing number of reports on dangerous batches of heroin. We are failing to acknowledge the changing landscape of drug supply in the UK and Europe, and unless we treat it like the public health crisis it is, scale up harm reduction responses and recognise that criminalising people who use drugs deters them from emergency and support services, more deaths are inevitable.”
Gomes called for decriminalisation “to ensure that we have the resources, tools and political support to keep people safe and prevent further tragedies”.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics show there were 4,907 deaths related to drug poisoning in England and Wales in 2022, the latest year for which statistics are available – the highest number since records began in 1993.