By Mary O’KEEFE

In 2022, close to 83,000 people died from opioid overdoses in the U.S., the majority from fentanyl and other highly potent synthetic substances, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

“What we see in Glendale is the effect of what fentanyl brings to the [City]  and … globally,” said Detective Guillermo Jimenez, Glendale Police Dept. 

He added that officers on patrol will see the effects of fentanyl on a variety of people including the homeless.

“You see people who are slumped over on benches that appear to be sleeping … that’s the effect that fentanyl has,” he said. “It is a very potent opioid that can either be smoked or ingested through the nose but the most popular way of doing it is smoking.”

When officers respond to some of those who are “slumped over” they find they are non-responsive and officers have to administer Narcan to reverse an overdose. 

Narcan is the brand name for naloxone that is used in a nasal form to reverse an opioid overdose. 

Even though the threat of fentanyl has been a topic shared by politicians, emergency responders, rehabilitation centers, the media and local substance abuse prevention organizations, it is a drug that some may know that it’s dangerous but not why it’s dangerous.

Fentanyl is a potent synthetic opioid drug that was approved by the Federal Food and Drug Administration for use as an analgesic (pain relief) and anesthetic. As an analgesic it is about 100 times more potent than morphine and 50 times more potent than heroin. It was first developed in 1959 and introduced in the 1960s as an intravenous anesthetic. It is legally manufactured and distributed in the U.S., according to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). 

There is a misconception that if fentanyl is used just once the person will die, but that is not true.

“There is a very high risk of [overdosing] with fentanyl,” Jimenez said. But not all uses of fentanyl are fatal because users can never be certain how much fentanyl is actually in a pill or powder they’ve purchased. 

There is another misconception that the fentanyl problem is coming over the border from Mexico, and now from Canada, but that is not the whole story —according to the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol only about 0.2% of all seizures of fentanyl entering the U.S. are at the Canadian border. The rest was confiscated at the Mexico/U.S border. 

As of 2019, though, India was emerging as a source of finished fentanyl powder and fentanyl precursor chemicals, according to the DEA. 

“The fentanyl that we’re seeing here, specifically in Glendale and California, come from Mexico, that gets it from China … they buy in bulk and they have it transported to Mexico,” he added. 

He added Mexico has laboratories in a variety of areas, from warehouses to residential homes, where drug traffickers make the drugs that are sold on the street.

“The people who are making [these drugs] are not chemists,” Jimenez said. 

“Some drug dealers are mixing fentanyl with other drugs, such as heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and MDMA. This is because it takes very little to produce a high with fentanyl, making it a cheaper option. This is especially risky when people taking drugs don’t realize [those drugs] might contain fentanyl as a cheap but dangerous additive. They might be taking stronger opioids than their bodies are used to and can be more likely to overdose,” according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

MDMA is a synthetic chemical made in labs, according to the Dept. of Justice. 

The dealers can press fentanyl into pills that resemble legitimate medications, like oxycodone and Adderall. This contributes to the overdose rate from fentanyl because people think they are getting a specific drug from a drug dealer when they are getting a pill/powder that includes fentanyl. 

Once the drug gets into the states it enters the hands of narcotic traffickers who then sell it to the midsize level who then sell it to those at the street level. When they get their hands on the drug sellers want to make a profit so they will manipulate the drug. 

Jimenez said that once the drug is sold to the midsize or street level, traffickers mix the drug with other ingredients, like glutamine that people “can buy at a vitamin shop.” By the time the mixing and stretching of ingredients is done no one knows which pill is going to be the one taken that leads to an overdose.

Next week CVW will follow up with what the fentanyl effect has in the area and how law enforcement and non-profits are working to educate and stop the spread of this dangerous drug.