The Liberal Gun Club Forum

Deaths from the synthetic opioid fentanyl skyrocketed more than 1,000% from 2011 to 2016, according to a report released Thursday. The number of fatalities related to the drug held fairly steady between 2011 and 2012, hovering around 1,600 deaths in both those years. In 2013, the number increased to just over 1,900 fatalities. Beginning in 2014, though, fentanyl-related deaths began to double each year. In 2014, fentanyl was involved in 4,223 deaths. In 2015, it was 8,251 deaths. And in 2016, fentanyl-related deaths had jumped to 18,335. The report from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also analyzed who had been hardest hit by the fentanyl epidemic.

The researchers, who are part of the National Center for Health Statistics, found that while men and women had similar rates of fentanyl-related deaths from 2011 through 2013, that began to shift. By 2016, the rate of men dying from fentanyl overdoses was nearly three times that of women. And while there were increases in fentanyl-related fatalities in all age groups, the largest rate increases were among younger adults between the ages of 15 and 34. The rate of 15- to 24-year-olds who died from fentanyl overdoses increased about 94% each year between 2011 and 2016, and about 100% each year for 25- to 34-year-olds.

Researchers also found that while whites had the highest overall rates of fentanyl fatalities, death rates among blacks and Hispanics were growing faster. Between 2011 and 2016, blacks had fentanyl death rates increase 140.6% annually and Hispanics had an increase of 118.3% annually.

A National Center for Health Statistics report released in December found fentanyl to be the drug mostly commonly involved in overdose deaths. In 2016, the drug was responsible for nearly 29% of all drug overdose deaths, making it the deadliest drug in America. Researchers analyzed death certificate information that included mentions of fentanyl and fentanyl analogs. Previous analysis had not looked specifically only at fentanyl, but overall synthetic opioids.

Americans are now more likely to die from a drug overdose than a car accident. In 2017, drug overdoses killed more than 70,000 Americans, and opioids are the leading driver in US drug overdose deaths. Opioids are a class of drugs that includes illicit fentanyl and heroin, as well as commonly prescribed painkillers, such as oxycodone and morphine.

highdesert wrote: Thu Mar 21, 2019 1:25 pm Our failed drug policy at work and I haven't read about Democratic presidential candidates obsessing on it like they do on gun control though it kills more people.

senorgrand wrote: Thu Mar 21, 2019 3:18 pm Solving problems is hard and expensive. Restricting rights is cheap and easy.

Witness:

War on Drugs
War on Crime
War on Terror
War on Guns

In May 2016, a group of national health experts issued an urgent plea in a private letter to high-level officials in the Obama administration. Thousands of people were dying from overdoses of fentanyl - the deadliest drug to ever hit U.S. streets - and the administration needed to take immediate action. The epidemic had been escalating for three years.

The 11 experts pressed the officials to declare fentanyl a national "public health emergency" that would put a laserlike focus on combating the emerging epidemic and warn the country about the threat, according to a copy of the letter. "The fentanyl crisis represents an extraordinary public health challenge - and requires an extraordinary public health response," the experts wrote to six administration officials, including the nation's "drug czar" and the chief of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The administration considered the request but did not act on it.

The decision was one in a series of missed opportunities, oversights and half-measures by federal officials who failed to grasp how quickly fentanyl was creating another - and far more fatal - wave of the opioid epidemic. In the span of a few short years, fentanyl, a synthetic painkiller 50 times more powerful than heroin, became the drug scourge of our time. Fentanyl has played a key role in reducing the overall life expectancy for Americans.

If current trends continue, the annual death toll from fentanyl will soon approach those from guns or traffic accidents. Among the dead are the anonymous and the famous, including musicians Prince and Tom Petty. It is so powerful that just a few flecks the size of grains of salt can cause rapid death.

"Fentanyl was killing people like we'd never seen before," said Derek Maltz, the former agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration's Special Operations Division in Washington. "A red light was going off, ding, ding, ding. This is something brand new. What the hell is going on? We needed a serious sense of urgency."

But for years, Congress didn't provide significant funding to combat fentanyl or the larger opioid epidemic. U.S. Customs and Border Protection didn't have enough officers, properly trained dogs or sophisticated equipment to curb illegal fentanyl shipments entering the country from China and Mexico. The U.S. Postal Service didn't require electronic monitoring of international packages, making it difficult to detect parcels containing fentanyl ordered over the internet from China. CDC data documenting fentanyl overdoses lagged events on the ground by as much as a year, obscuring the real-time picture of what was happening.

Facing hotly contested midterm elections in 2018, Congress finally passed legislation aimed at addressing the increasingly politicized opioid crisis, including a measure to force the Postal Service to start tracking international packages.

"How many people had to die before Congress stood up and did the right thing with regard to telling our own Post Office you have to provide better screening?" Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, sponsor of the legislation, asked on the Senate floor last fall. Local and state leaders in hard-hit communities say the federal government wasted too much time at a cost of far too many lives.

"Everybody was slow to recognize the severity of the problem, even though a lot of the warning signs were there," said Republican Gov. Chris Sununu of New Hampshire, which has one of the highest fentanyl overdose rates in the United States.

For traffickers, illicit fentanyl produced in labs was the most lucrative opportunity yet, a chance to bypass the unpredictability of the poppy fields that produced their heroin. The traffickers could order one of the cheapest and most powerful opioids on the planet directly from Chinese labs over the internet.

featureless wrote: Thu Mar 21, 2019 3:22 pm

senorgrand wrote: Thu Mar 21, 2019 3:18 pm Solving problems is hard and expensive. Restricting rights is cheap and easy.

Witness:

War on Drugs
War on Crime
War on Terror
War on Guns

While I do take your point, I'm not convinced the first three on your list are cheap.