US authorities seized more than 115 million pills containing illicit fentanyl in 2023 – a dramatic increase that experts consider “alarming” and shows the need for greater public health efforts to prevent the distribution of these pills and possible overdoses.
A new study published Monday in International Journal of Drug Policy found that the number of individual pills containing fentanyl seized by law enforcement was 2,300 times higher in 2023 than in 2017. In total, 115,562,603 pills containing fentanyl were seized in 2023, while 49,657 were seized in 2017. The study also found that o The proportion of pills seized in relation to the total number of fentanyl seized has more than quadrupled – in 2023, pills represented almost half of illicit fentanyl seizures, while they represented just 10% in 2017.
“The availability of illicit fentanyl continues to skyrocket in the U.S., and the influx of pills containing fentanyl is particularly alarming,” said Joseph J. Palamar, lead author of the study and associate professor at New York University Grossman School of Medicine, in a statement. press release from National Institute of Health (NIH). “Public health efforts are needed to help prevent these pills from getting into the hands of young people and to help prevent overdoses among people who unsuspectingly take pills containing fentanyl.”
Of the nearly 107,000 drug overdose deaths in 2021, more than 75% involved an opioid, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many experts linking the overdose crisis to the spread of illicit fentanyl, which is a synthetic opioid about 50 times more potent than heroin. Just two milligrams of the drug can be lethal, according to the US Drug Enforcement Administration.
The new study found that most law enforcement seizures of fentanyl occurred in the western U.S., although historically, law enforcement seizures have been less common in that part of the country. The researchers said in their study that this highlights the importance of monitoring the supply of fentanyl in different regions to improve the public health response.
The study was funded by the NIH’s National Institute on Drug Abuse. Researchers collected data for the study through the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas program, a grant program administered by the Office of National Drug Control Policy that aims to reduce drug trafficking and misuse.
Police seizures can help indicate the availability of illicit drugs, even if they do not reflect the prevalence of drug use, according to the NIH press release.
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