We Need to Eradicate the Fentanyl Crisis in America, Today: 70% of Pills Seized by the DEA Contain a Lethal Dose of Fentanyl

According to the DEA, 7 out of every 10 pills seized by the DEA contain a lethal dose of fentanyl: "Laboratory testing indicates 7 out of every 10 pills seized by DEA contain a lethal dose of fentanyl." (https://www.dea.gov/onepill) That is a staggering statistic. The illicit drug market is flooded with fake pills (fake Oxycodone, fake Xanax, etc.) that, 70% of the time, contain enough fentanyl to kill you. That is mind-boggling. Yet, how much time does the media actually spend addressing this life or death issue? How much time do our politicians even discuss it, let alone try to solve it?

The answer is not nearly enough. Not even close. This is a country that is obsessed with news coverage that demonizes each leading political opponent on a 24 hours cycle. Sensational headlines about Joe Biden or Donald Trump garner clicks, and more clicks means more revenue. Gossip and innuendo have always been the heartbeat of the mainstream media. Providing a platform for critical debate is rarely its forte. Sadly, it may not be that far of a leap to conclude that the media isn't really concerned about educating the public on solutions to the fentanyl crisis. In some distorted sense, media heads probably crave more headline-worthy fentanyl tragedies. A celebrity overdosed on fentanyl? That should be a top story! Fentanyl is on the rise? Print it! Articles about a devastating epidemic that don't dig deep into potential solutions are nothing more than clickbait hollow messaging. It's easy to shock viewers. But it seems like the media mentality is like any other groupthink fallacy: someone else will fix it.

Why doesn't our news carve out at least a snippet of its mostly wasteful and repetitive 24 hour broadcasts to focus on actionable items to solve this crisis? Why don't our politicians do anything more than give 30 second canned answers during rare public debates identifying how bad the problem is but not really tell us how they will fix it? The population is tired of hearing about the crisis. We want answers and solutions. And we want them today.

If the media did actually care about the gravity of the fentanyl crisis, why doesn't the all-powerful Oz that is Google barely show any major media outlets covering the DEA's latest campaign of "One Pill Can Kill" that notifies the public about the 70% lethality rate of street pills? (A quick search only revealed one story from CBSNews.com covering the "One Pill Can Kill" campaign). Are we now to look to each individual government agency's website when we want to find newsworthy items? Mainstream media can quote the CDC left and right about a new strain of Covid, but why won't it focus on the DEA's even deadlier warning?

What about the politicians? Where are they on this issue? Why is this not a bipartisan issue of the upmost priority? Have we really as a country prioritized the national dialogue about such anticlimactic issues of whether the Speaker of the House will get elected on his 5th try over a deadly illegal drug that kills thousands of Americans a year?

We want to hear from the experts. Tell us the solution Let's have a debate. Let us know you are doing something. What can we do now and what can we do better? Do we need better education? Better policing? Better interception of drugs at the Southern border? Tougher sanctions against China, a hotbed of illegal fentanyl production that finds its way into the U.S. via Mexican cartels? Tougher sanctions on Mexico and other South American countries? How do we take on the cartels? How can we stop letting people full of greed prosper by killing our youth?

When America wants to step up to the plate and take this issue head on, we will be listening. It's time we act, and we must act now.