District attorney sounds alarm on ‘Rhino Tranq’ in Pa.

WYOMING COUNTY (WBRE/WYOU) — Wyoming County District Attorney Joe Peters put out a warning Thursday hoping to educate the public and first responders about the possibility of “rhino tranq” making it’s way to northeastern Pennsylvania from the Philadelphia area.

Peters says “rhino tranq” is the street name for the drug Medetomidine, an animal tranquilizer 100-200 times more powerful than Xylazine (“tranq”), which is commonly mixed with Fentanyl.

“While the drug has recently shown up in Philadelphia and not yet seen in Wyoming County, I want to get ahead of the problem by alerting law enforcement, Fire/ EMS, treatment providers, public health officials, parents, and students alike,” Peters said.

Peters says any street drug can be laced with these veterinary tranquilizers. One concern Peters has is that opioid reversal drugs, such as naloxone, have no effect when “tranq” is in the drugs.

“It is cause for even greater concern that Narcan, which is successful in reviving opioid and fentanyl overdose victims, will not work to neutralize the effects of “Rhino Tranq” (Medetomidine) or “Tranq” (Xylazine).” Fentanyl, “Tranq” and “Rhino Tranq” can be laced into any street drug, so ingesting them, even unknowingly, can kill you,” he added.

Peters also reminded the public that when you buy drugs off the street, you can never be sure of what’s actually in them.

“While drug trafficking organizations will always try to create new drugs and do so without concern for the cost to human life, our kids or society, we will continue to aggressively prosecute those individuals, while at the same time, fight them with public awareness efforts,” Peters concluded.

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