Fentanyl: A Colorado Crisis
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Fentanyl overdose deaths in Colorado are higher than they've ever been before, and there's no sign of the problem going away.
The troublesome trend spiked last year, when 534 people in Colorado died from Fentanyl. That was a 150% rise over the drug's deaths in 2019, when 214 died of Fentanyl.
The deaths far eclipse those from cocaine or heroin.
It's no wonder: it is 100 more powerful than Morphine; about 50 times more powerful than Heroin. Six grains of Fentanyl will kill most users.
It's been a fight to even sniff out the drug before it gets into the hands of users: the drug is typically manufactured in labs overseas, mixed with other opiates, and pressed into pills that mimic prescriptions. More times than not, users don't know their drug of choice is laced with Fentanyl.
According to CSPD Metro Vice Narcotics Unit Commander, Scott Wittington, it can either be ordered online from China, or it makes its way through an intricate delivery system in the U.S. once it crosses the border with Mexico, where the chemicals to make Fentanyl are not regulated as they are in America.
Customs and Border Protection has apprehended nearly 5,600 pounds of Fentanyl in the first three months of 2021. In 2020, 4,700 pounds were confiscated the entire year. Smugglers are constantly creating new ways to get the drug across the border -- in sheets -- or even burritos.
"Labs are ramping up extremely in Mexico," said Wittington. "These are no longer mom-and-pop shops. This is a highly sophisticated-run business that these cartels are running. The cartels have people in place in major cities all across the United States."
Traffic stops remain one of the ways in which drug mules can be stopped, but there's no way to spot or catch them all.
The drug is so dangerous, that if it's even suspected in an investigation, officers dress in HazMat gear. Even when it's stored as evidence, Fentanyl is double-bagged and stuffed in a taped paint can to keep it from aerating.
Nearly every week, El Paso County Coroner Dr. Leon Kelly performs an autopsy in which someone has died from Fentanyl.
"We typically think of crime and drug dealing as big-city problems. It's not. Your body's not prepared for this. Nobody's body is prepared for what these pills are," said Dr. Kelly.
The numbers prove it: 48 people in El Paso County died of Fentanyl in 2020; up from 21 in 2019.
"They depress your respiratory center. The part of your brain that says, 'You've gotta keep breathing, you've gotta keep breathing,' it suppresses that and makes you go to sleep. By the time you stop breathing, there's really only three minutes between that moment until you suffer irreversible brain damage," said Dr. Kelly.
Prosecuting those in the drug chain has gotten even harder: just when deaths started to spike, the Colorado Legislature decriminalized drug possession. If anyone has less than four grams of a Schedule I or II drug, it's a misdemeanor instead of a felony.
"We used to use the punishment for cooperation. It's harder now. Four grams of Heroin is not the same as four grams of Fentanyl. Four grams of Fentanyl -- that kills a lot of people," said Cañon City Police Department Commander Timothy Bell.
He says there's been a "major rise in opiate-based narcotics," even in the Cañon City community.
"We're going to try and do everything to eliminate it from our community," said Commander Bell.
Even if it means that in a growing number of cases -- it's a losing battle.
