ILLICIT FENTANYL KILLS USERS MORE QUICKLY THAN ANY OTHER DRUG TO EVER APPEAR ON AMERICAN STREETS

In a time of fentanyl and meth, we need to use law enforcement differently—and more often.

By Sam Quinones

Preliminary data from the CDC show that overdose deaths hit an all-time high in 2022, at nearly 110,000—almost 70 percent of which involved fentanyl.

Fentanyl is so potent and cheap that dealers add it to other street drugs, creating opioid-addicted daily customers from, say, casual cocaine users, even at the risk of killing them. It has all but chased heroin from the market. Users could live for decades on heroin. But as one Kentucky addict in recovery told me a few years ago, when fentanyl settled into his region,

There’s no such thing as a long-term fentanyl user.

He recently relapsed and died of what is believed to be a fentanyl overdose.

A bag of Fentanyl held in Portland, Oregon (Jordan Gale)

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/06/harm-reduction-decriminalization-fentanyl-meth/674214