| | |  Health & Beauty | July 2008 
More Than 1,000 Fentanyl Deaths Tracked to Mexican Drug Operation
 Megha Satyanarayana - Detroit Free Press
go to original
| | Lauren Jolly was a popular girl from a wealthy suburb, but she ended up dead in a dilapidated drug house. The Free Press tracked the path of an illicit drug that authorities say moved from Mexico to Detroit and beyond, killing hundreds of addicts in its wake. Click HERE for Fentanyl: A Free Press Special Report | | |
More than 1,000 deaths linked to the painkiller fentanyl were reported nationally during a two-year span, traced to a drug operation in Mexico, according to a report released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The source was the same one identified in a 2007 Free Press investigation into the deadly cocktail of heroin and fentanyl that plagued metro Detroit. The CDC came to Detroit in 2006, as well as other major cities, as fentanyl-related deaths were peaking.
That year alone saw 195 suspected fentanyl deaths reported in Wayne County, a more than six-fold increase from previous years.
The CDC found 1,013 deaths nationally between April 2005 and March 2007, peaking in June 2006.
Wayne County Medical Examiner Carl Schmidt said today that fentanyl works so quickly and is so powerful that “Some people died with needles still in their arms.”
Fentanyl is used for pain management in severe cases, but was often mixed with heroin during the outbreak.
There likely were more fentanyl-related deaths, Schmidt noted, but not every hospital would test for fentanyl.
In response to the outbreak, Wayne County started a community outreach program to try and reach drug users and people in recovery to draw attention to the problem.
“Most people don’t think that drug abuse is a public health issue,” Schmidt said. |
|
| |
Vallarta Weddings
Tell a Friend
Site Map
Print this Page
Email Us