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People buying pain medication in the streets of Orange County might think they really have the right idea
Chances are they are wrong and the consequences could be deadly.
"The pills they sell, they look like the ones you get in the store," said Orange County Attorney David Hoovler. "Trusting your broker is a misplaced trust at first."
Officials said the Feb. 5 drug sweep, with 1,300 counterfeit oxycodone tablets containing fentanyl, $ 200,000 in cash and over two dozen firearms seized, was a first for Orange County in terms of scale and size, prosecutors said.
The phenomenon of counterfeit pills – illegally manufactured fentanyl disguised as legitimate pharmaceuticals – has snowballed in recent years, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration.
According to the Partnership for Safe Nonprofit Drugs, since January, fentanyl pills disguised as prescription painkillers have been seen in 46 states, and 29 of these states have linked deaths to counterfeits.
Fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid, is becoming increasingly available in our region, Hoovler said.
"Heroin is ubiquitous," said Hoovler. "We are starting to see cocaine containing fentanyl and the pills are pretty common," especially among middle-class users.
"They can buy these products online, it's the scariest part," said Orange County legislator Robert Sassi, who has used his elected term to deal with the opioid crisis.
A retired teacher at Valley Central Schools, he has seen 11 former students die as a result of an opioid overdose.
Sullivan County Attorney Jim Farrell said that a single counterfeit pill had been seen in Sullivan, so far, and that the pill was not well prepared.
This form did not slow down the fatal rate of overdoses in Sullivan County: 27 in 2017; and from 25 to October 2018, many involving a form of fentanyl, according to county registers.
While Orange County officials had not tied death to the February 5 bankruptcy pills, Hoovler said he was certain the arrests saved lives.
There is a reason for his certainty.
"The presence of counterfeit pills containing fentanyl in one area is increasingly associated with peaks in overdose deaths," according to the DEA's National Assessment of the Drug Threat in 2018.
DEA tests on counterfeit pills in 2017 found that the tablets contained 0.03 to 1.99 milligrams of fentanyl.
Two milligrams of fentanyl taken alone would be deadly for most people.
"They do not choose to buy something with fentanyl that will end their day," Sassi said.
"They think they're buying a pill for $ 25 and think it's OxyContin or Xanax. An unsuspecting soul buys it and someone finds it dead the next day. "
In January, researchers from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention published an analysis of overdose data in New York, which is consistent with the national trend: a sharp increase in the number of accidental overdose deaths starting in 2015, with fentanyl becoming more prevalent, increasing in 2016 and 2017, with fentanyl accounting for 57% of fatal overdoses in 2017.
Much of the illicit drug supply in our region comes from New York City.
Pills represent an important market for traffickers, noted the DEA in its assessment of the threat.
In 2016, about 3.4 million people abused prescription pain medication, compared to 475,000 who took heroin.
"I tell people, it could be your son, your daughter or your neighbor," said Sassi.
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