How widespread is fentanyl in the United States? Within just three and half months, enough fentanyl to kill 36 million people was seized on American soil—10 percent of the U.S. population.
The Justice Department (DOJ) recently announced that from May to September, the Drug Enforcement Administration seized more than 10 million fentanyl pills and about 1,000 pounds of fentanyl powder.
Three hundred ninty related cases have been investigated. One-eighth of them involve overdose poisonings, and a third are somehow linked to social media platforms like TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat.
Fentanyl has been dubbed the deadliest drug for Americans. In 2021, more than 100,000 people died from overdoses, two third of them from fentanyl or other synthetic opioids.
Most fentanyl precursors originate from China.