One of the two Arklow drug-users who died on Friday had bought methadone, a heroin substitute, on a Dublin street two days before his death, it emerged yesterday.
Mr Larry Byrne (22), who was buried in Arklow yesterday, bought the substance outside the Custom House on Wednesday and arrived at a house at Harbour Road, Arklow, that evening asking if he could stay the night.
The occupants of the house, speaking on the Today with Pat Kenny programme on RTÉ yesterday, said they asked if he was all right or needed a doctor. He said he was fine and went to bed.
They said he slept all the next day. They were sure of this as they heard him snoring. But on Friday, when they went to his room at around 11 a.m., he was dead.
His death coincided with that of another Arklow man, Mr Thomas Long (23), at 6 a.m. on Friday at Loughlinstown Hospital in Dublin. He too was a drug-user and had gone to the hospital seeking treatment two days before he died.
Gardaí are investigating whether the deaths are connected. They are examining if contaminated heroin or a concoction of drugs combined with methadone contributed to the deaths. A post- mortem was carried out on Mr Long's body yesterday.
The revelation that Mr Byrne purchased methadone on the streets raises questions about how this could have happened. Methadone treatment protocols introduced by the Department of Health in 1998 aimed to ensure addicts took methadone in the presence of a doctor or pharmacist.