5th Overdose Death May Be Linked To Fake Percocet: Georgia Officials

ATLANTA, GA -- A Macon man became the fifth fatal overdose in Middle Georgia linked to a street drug sold as Percocet, Patch has learned. The Macon-Bibb County coroner identified the victim as 34-year-old Robert Ketchup, according to news reports.

South and Middle Georgia have seen more than 30 overdoses recently, evidence that the state is perilously close to a prescription drug epidemic. State analysts investigating mass overdoses in parts of Georgia said last week that they found a new substance they were not previously familiar with, calling it a "consistent with a new fentanyl analogue."

Over a 48-hour period earlier last week, hospitals in several Georgia cities, including Centerville, Perry, Macon and Warner Robins, reported overdoses -- and four fatalities related to street drugs taken under the pretense that they were prescription drugs.

Georgia Officials Find Potent New Form Of Fentanyl In Mass Overdoses

Ketchup had "a bunch of pills on him," the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports. He died Sunday at Coliseum Medical Centers, where he was brought after being found unconscious at his mother’s home days before.

The Bibbs County Sheriff's Office said on its Facebook page recently that yellow oval-shaped pills have numbers 10/325 on one side and the word "Percocet" on the other side.

"On the counterfeit pills the word PERCOCET is not stamped as deep as the manufacturer typically does on their pills. Also on the counterfeit pills, the imprint of the name is also at an angle."

The sheriff said that, "Everyone is strongly encouraged to treat these pills or anything resembling these pills as hazardous."

State law enforcement officials are asking anyone who comes into contact with the illicit pills or anything that looks similar to them to call the Bibb County Sheriff's Office at 478-751-7500, or Macon Regional Crimestoppers at 1-877-68CRIME.

Image Facebook / Bibbs County Sheriff's Office