Fentanyl

FENTANYL

The synthetic opioid fentanyl killed nearly 108,000 Americans from August 2021 to August 2022. That is more Americans than were killed in wars in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

The ingredients to make fentanyl are smuggled from China into Mexico and combined to make the drug in remote areas of that country, from where it is trafficked across the US border. Some Republican politicians advocate sending US troops into Mexico to go after the drug cartels, a move which would probably be as futile as sending the US army across the border in 1916 to chase Pancho Villa. The US hostility toward China has shut down any

cooperation from that quarter. The situation is complicated by smuggling from the US to Mexico of firearms: 70% of guns recovered in Mexico in 2014-18 came from the US. And what is being done to curb the market for drugs in the US?

The situation is complex and there are no easy answers. 

Source: The Economist, 5/13/23