Fascinating podcast (see link below) explains why opioid use & related deaths continue to climb despite the best efforts of various government agencies and law enforcement.
The elephant in the room: Fentalyl...it's super potent, in everything, super cheap to make and small (making it super easy to bring into the country).
100,000 people die each year from drug use, approximately 90% of which are Opioids. Two-thirds of those are from Fentanyl. The death rate exceeds traffic fatalities, suicides, and homicides and is the leading cause of death for our young. There's more people dying than from any other drug problem in our history by a massive margin.
Fentyenol is super strong...50 times stronger than Morphine. Even a very small overdose will kill you. It's also being laced into Cocaine, Methamphetamines, etc. In fact among various drug users, 80% test positive for Fentynal but only 20% indicate they've taken the substance. They're getting it from other drugs without being aware.
Fentanyl on the street is notoriously unpredictable. The strength varies immensely per batch. You think you're having the same does as last time but you end up dead. Or you take another drug without realizing it's "there" and you OD.
Fentanyl is super easy and profitable to produce. Unlike Heroin, Cocaine, and other drugs which are derived from poppies Fentalyl is made cheaply in a lab (it's synthetic). There's no need to find a place to grow the crops, protect your turf by paying off a warlord, or risk smuggling it into the country. It costs 99% percent less to produce the stuff than other alternatives. China is the world's leader in exporting illegal versions of the stuff.
It's remarkably compact and impossible to detect by our border enforcement (even if we had a border...haha). It's estimated that the entirely yearly supply of US Fentyl could fit in a large track.
Bottom line. Putting the genie back in the bottom is going to be tough.
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