A drug that’s used to tranquilize horses and elephants has been linked to nearly 300 overdose-related deaths across the Midwest in recent weeks. Heroin is being laced with carfentanil, a synthetic opioid, causing a spike of deaths across several states, including Ohio. According to a recent NPR article, the drug “is 100 times more potent than fentanyl.” And if it’s not enough to illustrate how much more potent carfentanil is than the drug that killed Prince earlier this year, it is also 10,000 times stronger than morphine. In fact, following a rash of overdoses on the drug, Ohio declared a public health emergency in hopes of stopping this unsettling movement.
Deadly New Trend
Carfentanil is “so strong that just a few granules the size of grains of table salt can be lethal,” a Time article observed. In recent years, illegal drug dealers have disguised fentanyl and, now, carfentanil as heroin—with deadly results. Many drug users simply don’t know what they’re buying. Carfentanil, also known as Wildnil, has particularly devastated parts of southern Ohio, including the Cincinnati area. “Instead of having four or five overdoses in a day, you’re having these 20, 30, 40, maybe even 50 overdoses in a day,” Tom Synan, head of the Hamilton County Heroin Coalition Task Force, told NPR.
The Time feature focused on Ohio as the drug’s Ground Zero. “One of the hardest-hit spots was Hamilton County, home to Cincinnati, where on a single day in late August there were 48 heroin overdoses and two deaths,” the feature said. “From Aug. 15 to Sept. 4, the Drug Enforcement Administration has recorded 208 overdoses, and local officials say at least eight deaths in the Cincinnati area have been linked to carfentanil.” The drug’s effect has been swift since its arrival on the scene in July, overwhelming many first responders who weren’t prepared. “Their efforts are truly heroic, to be going from call to call to call,” he says. “One district alone had seen 14 in one shift, so they were nonstop,” Synan said.
Up north in Cuyahoga County, home to Cleveland, there were 52 overdose deaths in August, too. That’s the most drug-related fatalities the county has ever seen. Nearby states reported “similar overdose spikes” in the last month, including Indiana, West Virginia and Kentucky. Police have responded to the public health emergency by giving it front-page attention. Look no further than the stomach-turning photo that police in East Liverpool, Ohio released, showing an overdosed couple with their four-year-old son sitting in the back seat.
Did You Say “Elephant Tranquilizer”?
Carfentanil is 100 stronger than fentanyl, the drug that famously claimed Prince’s life earlier this year. Created in 1974, carfentanil is so powerful that it’s never been approved for human use. Instead, it’s used to sedate large animals, or as a weapon. It’s potent to anyone who simply touches or inhales it. The NPR story on the drug cites a 2002 hostage rescue operation in Moscow where “Russian Special Forces sprayed a chemical aerosol into the building [and]more than 100 hostages were overcome and died,” it said. “Laboratory tests by British investigators later revealed that the aerosol included carfentanil.” When someone overdoses on a drug this potent, it’s hard to revive them with naloxone, the emergency drug that medical responders use to reverse the effects of opioids. “”We’ve been getting lots of reports that they’re using two or three doses to get people to come back,” a health commissioner told NPR, claiming that he’s trying to deliver more concentrated versions of naloxone.
The drug, which is “even highly restricted for veterinarians,” has at least one attractive quality for illicit drug dealers: “You don’t have to worry about growing poppy fields and converting the poppy resin into morphine and into heroin,” DEA spokesperson Russ Baer told Time. Carfentanil can be made cheaply in a lab and cut into heroin, which makes it “more potent and addictive.” Currently, the carfentanil that’s appearing on the streets of Ohio has been imported from China “by way of South America or Mexico,” officials believe. Mexican labs may also be responsible but, unfortunately, there’s no way of telling for sure. Baer says some of the drug is “brought in by Mexican drug traffickers, then sold at huge profit” since it takes only a tiny amount to cause a high. “You can go on the Internet and anybody can establish an anonymous account, and you can order carfentanil directly from China,” he warned.
Turning Point
Carfentanil is just the latest chapter in what was already a tragic story. Prescription painkiller addiction has ravaged many states for the last decade. The CDC has declared opioid overdoses a national epidemic, with nearly 80 Americans dying every day. As lawmakers tighten regulations on legal drugs, addicts often find themselves turning to the black market for heroin, “which produces a similar high to that of pain pills like Oxycodone or Oxycontin,” as the Time article says. Unfortunately, the rise of carfentanil may signal a shift of tides when it comes to what types of drugs are hitting the street.
“We may be seeing more and more synthetic opioids from this point forward,” Baer told NPR, “and we’re going to have to prepare for it.” While lawmakers steel themselves for a new onslaught, others believe that drugs like carfentanil change the game altogether. “To me, that’s just like pulling a gun out and shooting someone, because you know that a tiny bit can kill a person,” Tom Synan said in the NPR feature. “To me, it’s intentional. It’s murder.” In the meantime, getting hospitals, treatment centers and awareness programs involved to help addicts break the deadly cycle is the key. Unfortunately, this spike of deaths is incredibly difficult to contain. “It’s so widespread and so abundant right now with so many users,” Synan says. “There has been nothing like this.” Perhaps the best solution is to draw attention to the fact that it’s happening. Maybe it’ll be the awareness of America’s weakness for drugs that proves to its greatest strength in the fight.
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