U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Pennsylvania issued the following announcement on Jan. 29.
Every year thousands of Americans overdose on fentanyl, a laboratory-created opioid that is 50 times stronger than heroin. Fentanyl is often smuggled into the United States from China and Mexico, and because fentanyl is made in a lab, chemists can change its structure to create what are known as “fentanyl analogues.” These analogues, which can be thousands of times more potent than heroin, benefit drug traffickers looking to profit from addicts always in search of a stronger product.
Before 2018, fentanyl analogues could only be prosecuted under the Controlled Substances Analogue Enforcement Act, which was a cumbersome process that typically required extensive expert testimony and analysis to prove that the chemical structure of the analogue was “substantially similar” to a controlled substance. This provided an advantage to drug traffickers: each new formula—even ones with a single molecular change— required substantial extra resources to prove it was illegal.
In 2018, in an effort to remove this hurdle, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) temporarily classified all fentanyl analogues as Schedule I drugs. The emergency scheduling – limited to a two-year period -- also made the fentanyl analogues subject to stiff statutory mandatory minimum sentences. This classification provided U.S. Attorneys and law enforcement with the ability to keep pace with the drug traffickers flooding our communities with deadly analogues.
But without Congressional action, the DEA’s temporary classification will expire on February 6, 2020. Two weeks ago, the United States Senate unanimously passed a 15-month extension of the classification. Later this week, the House of Representatives will consider legislation extending the temporary order as well. The House should vote to enact this critical legislation.
If the House fails to enact the law, the whack-a-mole game will resume. Drug traffickers will develop fresh formulas of deadly drugs, and by the time a new formula is identified and criminalized, the traffickers will move on to the next one. The cartels will profit, and our communities will suffer.
Two recent cases in the Western District of Pennsylvania illustrate the danger of the analogues. In August 2017, Pittsburgh Police and SWAT officers searched a Pittsburgh residence they suspected of being a stash house for fentanyl and other drugs. During the search, a table with powdered drugs, including a fentanyl analogue called cyclopropyl, was accidentally overturned, sending large amounts of drugs into the air. From just that exposure, several police officers were taken to UPMC Mercy Hospital as a precautionary measure. Fortunately, no one suffered serious injuries from that incident.
But not all encounters with fentanyl analogues in the District have been so fortunate. For example, in September 2019, eight people at a party on the South Side of Pittsburgh overdosed on drugs that contained cocaine and acetyl fentanyl, another analogue. Three people died before emergency responders arrived, and several others were hospitalized due to exposure to the drugs.
In both of these cases, the ban of analogues helped to protect our community by providing a legal basis to prosecute these drug traffickers. Without the ban, holding individuals and organizations that distribute fentanyl analogues accountable would be difficult, if not impossible. The cartels know this, and if the temporary scheduling lapses, we can expect a flood of new, legal formulas of fentanyl.
Of course, not everyone in the community supports the legislation to extend the temporary ban. Some advocacy groups see the ban as falling short of addressing the underlying causes of substance abuse in the first place. To these groups, extending the temporary ban is simply not enough to address the crisis.
There’s no doubt that a coordinated, cross-community effort is needed to combat the opioid crisis. Although criminalizing fentanyl analogues is only one component in this fight, it is an important one. And, if the House fails to act now in the hopes of reaching a comprehensive solution to the crisis, it will be effectively legalizing new fentanyl analogues. Such a move will only serve to harm our communities, which deserve protection today. For that reason, members of the House of Representatives should join their Senate colleagues in unanimously passing this legislation.
Original source can be found here.