Whatcom fentanyl pill seizures rising with ‘no indication that this trend is slowing down’
The number of fentanyl pills seized by the Whatcom Gang and Drug Task Force in 2021 was more than 6½ times as many as it seized a year earlier and 20 times what it seized in 2019.
The task force seized almost 120,000 fentanyl pills last year, according to a Facebook post Tuesday, May 10, by the Whatcom County Sheriff’s Office, and that number did not include incidents or cases by other deputies or local agencies.
“There is no indication that this trend is slowing down,” the post reads. “We urge you to take precautions and become knowledgeable about the dangers this drug poses.”
For comparison to the number of pills seized in 2021, the sheriff’s office’s 2020 annual report showed the task force was responsible for seizing 18,104 fentanyl pills that year, while 6,000 were seized a year earlier, according to the 2019 annual report.
“The Sheriff’s Office has prioritized investigations into the distribution of Fentanyl and resulting deaths a high priority through the work of our Gang and Drug Task Force, our partnership with federal law enforcement and homicide investigations,” Sheriff Bill Elfo told The Bellingham Herald in an emailed statement. “We know that this deadly street drug is being laced with other forms of black market narcotics and places those who use it or even come into contact with it at a high risk of overdose.”
Whatcom County is not alone in seeing dramatic increases in fentanyl seizures.
A recent study by a consortium of researchers, led by New York University and released on sciencedirect.com, found that the number of fentanyl pill seizures nationwide increased from 42,202 pills during the first quarter of 2018 to more than two million during the final quarter of 2021 — a 4,850% growth.
“Every single state, we are seeing a dramatic increase in the amount of fentanyl coming in,” Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent in Charge Robert Hammer, who oversees operations in the Pacific Northwest, told The Bellingham Herald. “We see a similar level of increase (to what Whatcom County reported). “
Hammer estimated that every week within the Pacific Northwest Homeland Security, which partners with local law enforcement agencies, pulls about 30,000 to 40,000 fentanyl pills off the street from somewhere across the region.
“Unfortunately, that is a whole lot,” Hammer said.
What fentanyl is
Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that is 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine, is often used in counterfeit versions of legitimate-looking medications, according to a Guardian story about the national study, and it can be used in pills disguised to look like pharmaceutical versions of Percocet, Xanax, Adderall or its most commonly known counterfeit blue “M30” oxycodone form.
Fentanyl powder seizures nationally also are up, according to the study, but pill seizures now account for nearly 30% of all seizures meaning “people who obtain counterfeit pills, such as those disguised as oxycodone or alprazolam, are at risk for unintentional exposure to fentanyl.”
“These look just like prescription pills – that’s the scary part,” said the study’s lead author, Joseph Palamar, a professor of population health at NYU Grossman School of Medicine told the Guardian.
DEA Administrator Anne Milgram, as part of the first National Fentanyl Awareness Day, said fentanyl also is being mixed with cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine to make those substances even more deadly for people using them.
Unprecedented death rates
“Fentanyl is killing Americans at unprecedented rates,” Milgram said in a news release.
According to the DEA release, synthetic opioids, such as fentanyl, were involved in approximately 66% of the nearly 107,000 drug overdose deaths reported by the CDC between November 2020 and November 2021.
The dangers associated with fentanyl exposure have been seen within Whatcom County, as the sheriff’s office reported in a March 31 Facebook post that 10 deaths during the month of March were related to fentanyl.
For comparison, the sheriff’s office told The Herald that the Whatcom Gang and Drug Task Force reported:
▪ The first recognized case in Whatcom County involving fentanyl (in its counterfeit blue “M30” pill form) was in 2018.
▪ There were four fentanyl-related overdose deaths in 2019 in Whatcom County.
▪ There were 23 fentanyl-related overdose deaths in 2020 in Whatcom County.
▪ There were 11 fentanyl-related overdose deaths January-March 2021 in Whatcom County.
The Whatcom County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office posted about an increase in cases involving fentanyl in May of 2020, saying “Fentanyl is now being distributed within our community at an alarming rate,” adding, “It’s more dangerous than ever to take medication without a prescription with fentanyl in our community.”
And that is what makes Wednesday’s announcement of the seizures so important.
“I don’t discount taking one pill off the street,” Hammer told The Herald. “That one pill very well could be saving one life, so every pill that gets taken off the street is important.
“But it feels really (dang) good when we can take 100,000 pills off the street.”
Resources
The Whatcom County Sheriff’s Office has offered the following links to inform yourself about the dangers of fentanyl:
▪ nida.nih.gov/publications/drugfacts/fentanyl
▪ dea.gov/resources/facts-about-fentanyl
▪ cdc.gov/stopoverdose/fentanyl/index.html
▪ justice.gov/opioidawareness/opioid-facts
