Government’s Fentanyl Crackdown Is Bound to Fail, Like All Prohibitions Do

Overdose deaths recently reached a record high of 109,000 Americans, with roughly three-quarters involving opioids and 90 percent involving illicit fentanyl. As a result, lawmakers have decided to rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic, passing toothless laws that will make little difference in reducing harm.

Drug cartels make illicit fentanyl using several simple, readily available chemicals. As law enforcement cracks down on illicit fentanyl, it merely induces cartels to synthesize more potent analogs of fentanyl, called fentanyl-related substances (FRSs), which can be easier to smuggle in smaller sizes and subdivide into more units to sell.

One recent example is para-flourofentanyl, which is increasingly found in combination with or in place of fentanyl.