Carfentanil is back, driving overdose deaths higher in Ohio
Carfentanil has returned to Ohio at levels not seen since the overdose death peak of 2017. The ultra-dangerous drug appears to have causedOhio’s overdose death increase in 2019. It’s unclear if the drug is responsible for the overdose death surge underway in 2020 during COVID-19.
Are overdose deaths increasing during COVID-19?
Some evidence points to increased overdose death during COVID-19 because people are using alone. That leaves nobody there to reverse an overdose with Narcan or call 911. Drugs may be more potent, too, because reduced demand may mean less cutting and dilution of drugs.
Overdose deaths soar among blacks in Ohio
The rate of black overdose deaths is now nearly identical to that of whites. This epidemic is no longer mostly a white thing. What’s driving the increase in black deaths? Is race playing a role in government’s response to this epidemic vs. crack cocaine in the 1980s?
Be afraid: Fentanyl-laced cocaine on the rise in Ohio — again
Latest lab tests show fentanyl in more than 10% of cocaine Good news: deadly carfentanil has not returned to cocaine The share of cocaine containing fentanyl appears to have risen sharply in recent months, reversing a sharp drop in fentanyl-laced cocaine and...
Where is fentanyl added to cocaine? Mostly in Ohio. Result: 3,000 dead.
A new Harm Reduction Ohio study shows fentanyl adulteration of cocaine — a phenomenon that’s killed killed 3,000 Ohioans — is happening here, at the bottom of the supply chain, not in Mexico or South America.
VIDEO: Tino Fuentes explains how to use fentanyl test strips
Harm reduction consultant Tino Fuentes, who’s spending a week in Ohio as a guest of Harm Reduction Ohio, made a video with us explaining how to use fentanyl test strips.
What Harm Reduction Ohio readers want: Accurate information on Ohio’s drug supply
HRO’s most popular story, by far, tells readers the share of the cocaine supply that has fentanyl and carfentanil in it. What does this reader demand for information that tell us?
Tino Fuentes, fentanyl test strip guru, coming to Ohio
The great and colorful New York harm reduction advocate will spend a week in Ohio from August 22-29. You should meet him. Read our interview with the “pied piper of fentanyl test strips.”
Not Right: The problem with how reporters cover fentanyl
Reporters unwisely adopt the language and assumptions of law enforcement. This distorts coverage and misleads readers about basic facts and what’s important. To paraphrase a line from the newspaper movie “Absence of Malice,” daily journalism’s coverage of drugs is often accurate — but not true.
Gov. Kasich signs law punishing making fentanyl safer
Gov. Kasich signed SB 1, a reckless and sloppy law that gives long sentences for possessing diluted fentanyl. Fentanyl needs to be diluted in the extreme for safety reasons. Basing sentences on diluents — rather than the fentanyl itself — is crazy.
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