Gov.  , Gavin Newsom , announced this week that 5.8 million fentanyl- filled tablets were confiscated throughout , California , since January by the express ‘s , Counterdrug Task Force , in cooperation with local and federal law enforcement agencies.
However, experts claim that the seizures will likely not have a significant impact on the illegal drug market as state officials celebrate constantly increasing the confiscations of the artificial opioid.
Over the last three decades, the number of fentanyl- filled pills confiscated nationwide has increased considerably. In 2021, just 1.5 million tablets were seized nationwide. In 2022, that figure increased by almost tenfold to 10.3 million tablets. That figure more than doubled in 2023, reaching 22.2 million fentanyl-containing medications collected all over the state.
” Illegal methadone has no place in our districts”, Newsom said in a statement announcing the seizures. ” California is tackling this problem head-on by holding drug traffickers guilty and causing more spasms, while at the same time expanding the number of options for substance abuse treatment and offering life-saving, cheap turnaround treatments to Californians statewide.”
Brandon Hill, chairman of the , Office of Strategic Communications , in the , California Military Department , said that, if this year’s speed remains constant, 18 million tablets may be collected by the end of 2024, which is a” little reduction” from last year’s total.
California , has a plan to utilize Newsom’s billion- money investment to address the morphine and opioid problems. According to the state ‘s , 2023 master plan,$ 30 million has been poured into expanding the , California National Guard , through initiatives to hire, train and embed more people and funding fentanyl seizures. Over the course of the next two years, the Fentanyl Enforcement Program was going to be used to create and run the business to overcome manufacturing, distribution, and trafficking.
But , Keith Humphreys, a professor of psychiatry and habit scientist at , Stanford University, said that while he salutes law enforcement’s function in getting the drug off the streets, these big seizures are n’t difficult for criminals to change.
Humphreys claimed that traffickers who took advantage of the low cost of production, not necessarily because people were looking for that drug, brought fentanyl onto the streets.
However, because fentanyl is so cheap and easy to produce, drug enforcement policies that have stood in place for years largely do n’t apply, Humphreys said. The market would be hampered if a comparable amount of heroin had been seized by law enforcement because producers would have to wait for poppy plant growth and supply the ingredients. However, because the drug is entirely synthetic, fentanyl dealers can quickly replace supplies after law enforcement seizures.
” We’ve never had an illicit drug this potent on the markets in this country”, Humphreys said. ” The best we can do is damage control”.
Jerel Ezell, assistant professor of community health sciences and director of the , Center for Cultural Humility , at , UC Berkeley, echoed Humphrey’s sentiment, saying that the number of pills confiscated statewide does n’t mean much, because there does n’t need to be a lot of pills on the market to have a devastating societal effect.
According to Humphreys and Ezell, strictly regulating those who enter the illicit drug trade wo n’t completely solve the problem either. Because the government ca n’t necessarily catch every dealer out there, and even when they do, the producers can hire someone else to take their place, Ezell said, “playing whack a mole.” However, the penalties do matter when they affect people with “unique skills”, Humphreys said, like an accountant moving money around or a well- connected importer.
According to Humphreys, the state should invest in prevention by ensuring that children grow up healthy and lessen their risk of getting involved in drugs.
The state has budgeted about$ 97 million to distributing overdose medication, like Naloxone, throughout communities and public schools, making fentanyl test strips more available and funding grants for education, testing, recovery and support services.  , California , is also using$ 23 million to fund substance abuse disorder workforce grants and train non- behavioral health professionals with knowledge of substance use disorders. Additionally, the state is funding a$ 40.8 % awareness and education campaign to form partnerships and develop communication and education tools for parents and educators.
However, Ezell claimed that although making more affordable and usable fentanyl test strips or Narcan is a good immediate solution, these policies do n’t address the causes of drug use at all. In light of all of this, he argued for both policies to address economic strains that might lead to drug use, such as laws governing hosing issues and ending large corporation tax breaks.
” Most people do n’t start using harder drugs unless there’s a social or economic pressure on them”, Ezell said. ” And we do n’t have a simultaneous policy that’s going to address those issues”.
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