NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — On Thursday, the Drug Enforcement Agency’s New York Division released numbers on the amount of narcotics seized in the state last year, which includes nearly 2,000 pounds of fentanyl.
Along with the 1,958 pounds of fentanyl, or 72 million lethal doses, the DEA confiscated 1.9 million fentanyl-laced, fake prescription pills, 30,000 pounds of cocaine, over 700 pounds of heroin and 1,800 pounds of methamphetamine.
“To put that into perspective, throughout 2022 we seized enough deadly doses of fentanyl in New York for more than three times the population of New York State,” said DEA Special Agent in Charge Frank A. Tarentino III. “A deadly dose is just two milligrams of fentanyl and laboratory analysis shows that six out of ten fentanyl-laced, fake prescription pills are lethal.”
There were more than 3,000 fatal overdoses in New York city in the 12 months ending July 2022, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 8 in 10 of these deaths are due to fentanyl.
“Thousands of New Yorkers are mourning precious lives claimed by deadly fentanyl last year.” Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget G. Brennan said. “Fentanyl saturates the illegal drug supply in New York City and is a factor in roughly 80% of overdose deaths. Even casual or occasional illegal drug use could be fatal, and with an explosion in counterfeit pills containing fentanyl, a single tablet purchased online or on social media could be deadly.”
Nationwide, DEA seized over 50.6 million fentanyl-laced, fake prescription pills and more than 10,000 pounds of fentanyl powder in 2022. These seizures equate to more than 379 million potentially deadly doses of fentanyl, enough to kill every American, according to the DEA Laboratory.
The laboratory also recently revealed that six out of ten fentanyl-laced, fake prescription pills contained a potentially lethal dose of fentanyl, up from four out of ten in 2021.
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