“Fentanyl? Going to Colorado. People are addicted to fentanyl pills. Since I got out of jail, half of my friends died in two years. Fentanyl is everywhere. We call it ‘fetty’. ). But it’s no joke. We put it in the ‘speed’.”
Just arrived in Los Angeles from Colorado, Justin Echols, 31, has been wandering since he was 15.
In Los Angeles County, half of fentanyl victims die on the streets. “It has a link with heroin. Opiates, pills, fentanyl … it’s easy to get”, testifies Justin Echols, Tuesday in the RTS program Tout un monde.
The dose costs between three and five dollars. “It’s cheaper than food. It’s sad,” laments Justin Echols.
>> Also listen to the Le Point J podcast episode “What is fentanyl, this ultra-dangerous drug?”:
More than 100,000 overdoses per year
The fentanyl epidemic is just the latest and deadliest manifestation of a decades-simmering crisis in the United States.
In 2009, Regina Labelle was appointed to Barack Obama’s administration to stem a crisis, especially linked to the addiction to powerful painkillers that were pouring into rural areas.
“At the time, there were probably 20,000 overdoses every year, and the typical victim profile was a white male aged 45 to 55 living in Appalachia,” she recalls.
But the arrival of fentanyl in the United States from Mexico has changed the face of the epidemic. This opioid, manufactured in the laboratory, is more powerful and less expensive. It contaminates many illicit substances. And the number of victims has multiplied by five.
“More than 100,000 people died of overdoses in 2021. And it’s not just white people. We’ve seen a huge increase in statistics among Native Americans, just like in the black population. So the situation has changed over time. It’s the same basic problem, but it affects different populations and geographic regions”, analyzes Regina Labelle.
Distraught parents
In the posh Los Angeles suburb of Pasadena, Ed Ternan and his wife learned the hard way regarding fentanyl. In May 2020, the couple lost their son Charlie. He was only 22 years old. When Ed Ternan talks regarding his youngest son, he uses the past tense, but slips into the present. “Charlie is kind and a good student, especially in mathematics.”
This day in May 2020, Charlie is at his college fraternity house. He and a friend order pills on social media: xanax, but also a blue pill, perocet. Her doctor had already prescribed her powerful painkiller for her chronic back pain.
Death occurred between 15 to 20 minutes, according to the medical examiner. An overdose. But Ed Ternan prefers the term poisoning. The supposed painkiller her son took was actually fentanyl.
“Later… The police found all the xanax they had bought too. They tested everything, and it was also counterfeit, he says. It was then that my wife, Mary, and I learned all regarding fentanyl and counterfeit pills: young people all over the country are dying following consuming fentanyl hidden in many substances. Fentanyl has become the raw material of choice for black market dealers.”
fifty billion dollars
From their home, the Ternan family launched Song for Charliean NGO that works with social networks and launches awareness campaigns.
“Now, 36% of secondary school students are aware of the risks. But there is a lot of work to be done,” says Ed Ternan.
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In 2023, American local authorities will begin to receive some 50 billion dollars (46 billion francs) to finance prevention programs.
This financial windfall stems from the settlement of legal complaints once morest the manufacturers of opioids.
Jordan Davis/Rehearsal
