The Rise of Synthetic Fentanyl and Replacing Heroin

For the last 60 years the city of Baltimore has struggled with heroin addiction and this has led to increased crime and high levels of desperation. This is the same story within the city’s neighborhoods. However, things have changed in the city as users now say that it’s practically impossible to find the drug in the city despite the deep history that the city has had with the drug. Areas that had also seen the heroin epidemic grow include rural Appalachia, New England mills towns as well the Eastern Seaboard areas. Users in these areas now say that finding the drug is proving difficult. The city of New York despite been regarded as the biggest distribution hub in the United States has seen heroin distribution drop in an unprecedented rate. The gradual decline in heroin supply can be interpreted as a win for law enforcement officers in these areas as well as the public health officials. However, this is not the case for the city of Baltimore as the people who have been using heroin now face a new challenge. There is a new drug called synthetic fentanyl that has caused many deaths due to overdose. According to law enforcement officials in the area, the drug is readily affordable due to its cheap price. Synthetic fentanyl is also very easy to distribute according to law enforcement officers.

The rise of the drug to replace heroin has been well documented with health officials saying that the drug is 50 times stronger than the old heroin. The old people as well as African-Americans are the people who have been affected by the surging overdoses. People who have used the drug say that they only remember injecting themselves with the drug and then waking up a few hours later from the ground. This means that the drug spreads very fast. Baltimore City Need Exchange Program director Derrick Hunt acknowledges that some of their clients are dying at an unprecedented rate. The New York Times has learned that the rise of fentanyl has been due to economic reasons. Dealers in America don’t have to wait for the poppy plants to grow and become harvested in Mexico before they are transported to America. Instead the dealers are now buying the product from China and Mexico. Others are just buying precursor chemicals from abroad and then using clandestine labs in the United States to manufacture the drug. The spread of heroin began 10 years ago when it became impossible to acquire the addictive prescription drugs.