“Those who have bought drugs in the past 24 hours should get rid of them,” Sergio Berni, Minister of Security of the Buenos Aires state government, said in a televised statement.
He added that the authorities were “trying to locate this toxic substance in order to remove it from circulation.”
The police carried out raids in Tres de Febrero, a popular neighborhood northwest of the capital, during which about ten people were arrested, according to the minister.
The minister explained that the police found in their possession bags of cocaine similar to those identified by the relatives of the victims.
The authorities issued this urgent warning, Wednesday, after deaths and serious poisoning occurred in three hospitals in the suburbs of Buenos Aires.
Media reports quoted medical reports as saying that the victims, including men in their thirties and forties, died of violent convulsions and sudden heart attacks.
The San Martin County Prosecutor’s Office, where these incidents occurred, said that “it was found that a highly toxic substance sold as cocaine is currently being circulated,” appealing to everyone in possession of drugs to be careful.
For his part, Bernie warned his compatriots that “when we say bad cocaine, we are not talking here about spoiled or expired cocaine, but about a poisonous substance.”
He added that “every promoter who buys cocaine cheats on it. Some do it by mixing it with non-toxic substances like starch, others put hallucinogens in it, and if there is no control this kind of thing happens.”
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