By Daily Mail Reporter The death toll has risen to 22 in a killer heroin epidemic that has plagued the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for the last nine days. Numerous more victims of the super-powered heroin are flooding emergency rooms with non-fatal overdoses and even drug dealers are beginning to warn customers about the potency of the new strain. Health officials believe the culprit is heroin laced with fentanyl, an opiate 100 time more powerful than morphine. The new hotshots are being sold on the street marketed as 'Theraflu,' 'Bud Ice' and 'Income Tax,' according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Public health officials, along with federal, state and local police are rattling the bushes, rounding up addicts and dealers alike to determine the source of the deadly drugs.
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Investigators have found many of the drug users possessed heroin bags labelled 'Theraflu,' 'Bud Ice' and 'Income Tax'
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Tests revealed those bags were laced with the super powerful narcotic Fentanyl
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Experts have likened the rash of deaths to the 1988 synthetic heroin called 'China White' killed 18 in the city
'We’re obviously dealing with a major public health crisis,' he said, something 'bringing to mind the very localized @placeholder epidemic we had in 1988.'