Dope In Philly's So Strong, DEA Agents Have To Wear THIS When Raiding Damn, I hate to see our city be, really, the center of the opioid epidemic in America. We have the highest overdose rate and it doesn't look to be going down anytime soon.On top of that, fentanyl has been found in street heroin more and more often. This has been killing users at a proportionately higher rate.
Inside a Philadelphia heroin mill in early September, law enforcement found more than 30,000 bags of the opioid.The big bust in the Summerdale section nearly became a catastrophe when three city police officers and a state investigator were overcome by what some believe was the deadly synthetic opioid, fentanyl.
Narcan saved their lives.
It was the most recent lesson for law enforcement, and first responders like paramedics, in the ever-growing opioid epidemic: More protective gear than ever is needed when responding to an opioid-related incident.Other incidents, like an overdose in Bucks County in July that sent two paramedics, an EMT and a firefighter to a nearby hospital, are forcing local authorities to buy better protection. Since fentanyl officially entered the southeastern Pennsylvania illicit drug market last year, first responder overdoses have become a major concern.
Fentanyl is many times stronger than heroin.
"Whereas heroin can kill you in milligrams, fentanyl can kill you in micrograms,” said Gary Tuggle, the Drug Enforcement Administration's agent-in-charge for Philadelphia. -(George Spencer & Brian X. McCrone, NBC 10)
This is getting out of hand!
Credit: NBC Philadelphia