"Known as epibatidine, the poison is produced by wild dart frogs native to parts of South America meaning Navalny could not have accidentally taken the poison. Only the Russian state had the means, motive and opportunity to deploy this lethal toxin to target Navalny during his imprisonment in a Russian penal colony in Siberia, and we hold it responsible for his death, the UK government has stated."
"Epibatidine was certainly an efficient choice: it is a powerful painkiller thought to be hundreds of times more potent than morphine and can cause muscle paralysis. Your chest wall doesn't expand and contract, so essentially you can't breathe and you're [suffocated], said Alastair Hay, emeritus professor of environmental toxicology, University of Leeds. And there is another chilling twist. There isn't an antidote to this [poison] that I know of, said Hay."
"But while the epibatidine might seem exotic and even ostentatious, it is not as obscure as it might first seem. As Hay notes, the chemical has long been studied as a painkiller for lung conditions ranging from pulmonary fibrosis to sarcoidosis, but its high toxicity precludes its therapeutic use. As a result researchers in countries including Russia have been making chemicals with a similar structure, apparently in the hope of harnessing epibatidine's analgesic properties without its toxicity."
The toxin epibatidine, produced by South American dart frogs, was used to kill Alexei Navalny during imprisonment in a Siberian penal colony. The UK attributes the killing to the Russian state, citing exclusive means, motive and opportunity. Epibatidine is a powerful analgesic hundreds of times stronger than morphine, capable of causing muscle paralysis and respiratory failure, and lacks a known antidote. The compound has been studied for lung disease pain but is too toxic for therapy. The structure is known and can be synthesized; analogues are produced and available for research.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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