{"id":29038,"date":"2024-02-25T06:30:00","date_gmt":"2024-02-25T13:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/as-deaths-from-fentanyl-continue-colorado-pushes-for-action\/"},"modified":"2024-02-25T13:30:00","modified_gmt":"2024-02-25T13:30:00","slug":"as-deaths-from-fentanyl-continue-colorado-pushes-for-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/as-deaths-from-fentanyl-continue-colorado-pushes-for-action\/","title":{"rendered":"As deaths from fentanyl continue, Colorado pushes for action"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"The
The Cortez Police Department and Montezuma County Sheriff\u2019s Office have seen an increase of fentanyl seizures in the county. Montezuma County Sheriff\u2019s Office<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

In 2018, Andrea Thomas got news that all parents dread. Her 32-year-old daughter Ashley, a mom herself, had died. The culprit was half a counterfeit pill that contained fentanyl, a synthetic opioid.<\/p>\n

Thomas recalled, \u201cWe didn\u2019t even know what illicit fentanyl was. We didn\u2019t know about it at all. And neither did my daughter.\u201d<\/p>\n

The loss of her daughter spurred Thomas to act, and within six months she was in Congress giving briefings on the dangers of fentanyl. \u201cI thought naively that once they learned about the seriousness of this, that they would begin to share the message. And they didn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

She launched the Voices for Awareness Foundation in Grand Junction. And she watched as the time for Congress to address the issue ticked by.<\/p>\n

In 2018, just over 100 Coloradans died from fentanyl. Four years later that number had jumped to more than 900, according to the DEA. Numbers from the CDC show that, across the country, 112,000 people died of overdoses from May 2022 to May 2023, and a recent study estimates that 40% of Americans know somehow who died of an overdose.<\/p>\n

If Congress had focused on the issue when Thomas and others were starting to talk about it, \u201cit would have made a difference, in thousands, hundreds of thousands of lives,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Thomas views the situation as both a public health crisis and a national security crisis.<\/p>\n

She said she wants to see Congress take several steps, including doing more to prevent the chemicals that are used to make illicit fentanyl from coming into the country. The Biden Administration reached a deal with China last November to crack down on Chinese companies that make chemicals used in fentanyl.<\/p>\n

Thomas would also like to see it classified permanently as a Schedule 1 drug. And she added she\u2019d even go one step further.<\/p>\n

\u201c (It) would be wonderful if they would declare it a weapon of mass destruction because then it would hit all levels.\u201d<\/p>\n

The idea is that labeling the drug as a WMD would pull new resources into the fight, including from the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security.<\/p>\n

Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert has a bill to do just that, but her office would not make her available for an interview. Fellow Republican Rep. Brad Wenstrup of Ohio, a surgeon, has also introduced an expanded version of the idea.<\/p>\n

In an interview with CPR News, Wenstrup explained that he approached the idea from his seat on the Intelligence Committee.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m concerned about fentanyl being aerosolized \u2013 could be brought on a drone, dropped over a crowd. I mean, there\u2019s all these really horrific things that could happen from that,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I think that we need to up the game. I think we need to put it at a higher level.\u201d<\/p>\n

This proposal to classify illicit fentanyl a WMD \u2013 even though it\u2019s so far never been used as a weapon in the traditional sense \u2013 was first floated during the Trump administration but didn\u2019t gain traction.<\/p>\n

Wenstrup admits that with everything else on Congress\u2019 to-do list, this may not be something lawmakers take up any time soon. But, he said, it\u2019s just about planting the seed of an idea, \u201cand sometimes it\u2019s two years later, four years later, you got to continue that effort.\u201d<\/p>\n

The grindingly slow pace of legislation is also why advocates on the ground don\u2019t necessarily look to Congress to solve this problem with the urgency they think it deserves, but rather state government. Colorado lawmakers have taken up numerous bills on the issue in recent years, including reinstating tougher penalties for dealers.<\/p>\n

But Lisa Raville, executive director of the Harm Reduction Action Center in Denver, worries that at both the state and federal level, policymakers are just repeating the past.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, all they keep doing is doubling down on the worst ideas of the drug war, which are incarceration and criminalization,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Reville would like to see Congress get ahead of the curve, such as developing testing strips for emerging drug threats, like xylazine.<\/p>\n

But when it comes to saving lives from fentanyl, her message to Congress is simple: instead of cracking down, \u201cI would be advocating for overdose prevention centers and a safe (drug) supply.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fentanyl crisis, like the decades long war on drugs, is a big problem with many avenues of attack. It\u2019s why last year Rep. Joe Neguse founded the bipartisan Fentanyl Prevention Caucus, as a place where lawmakers from different parts of the country, with different backgrounds, could learn from experts about potential policy solutions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wanted to take a breath and really make sure that we were engaging the experts in a meaningful way before we outlined the more comprehensive solutions that might be what we pursue,\u201d he told CPR News.<\/p>\n

The caucus rolled out a small package of bills earlier this year. One focuses on a tax credit for companies researching drug abuse issues, including emerging threats, fentanyl and related substances, methamphetamines, and other emerging threats. The other is a pay incentive for people with cyber-skills to combat fentanyl trafficking online.<\/p>\n

Other Colorado lawmakers, like Rep. Brittany Pettersen, are pulling from personal experience as they approach this issue.<\/p>\n

Pettersen\u2019s mother suffered from an opioid addiction and overdosed often once fentanyl came into the drug supply.<\/p>\n

While her main interest is the public health avenues, the first term Democrat is also using her seat on the Financial Services Committee to tackle the problem, by \u201cgoing after the illicit financing side of drug trafficking. And so making sure that the bad actors aren\u2019t utilizing our financial system.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s been a different way to approach it,\u201d said Pettersen, \u201cbut definitely rewarding.\u201d<\/p>\n

While it\u2019s hard for anything to get through this Congress, Pettersen does see people working together in this area at least.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a complicated issue, but we can solve this with the right policies. And that\u2019s what keeps me going every day. I need more partners in Congress who actually want to get these things done.\u201d<\/p>\n

The next possible action could be around funding \u2013 Congress is currently crafting its budget, which could contain more money to tackle the fentanyl problem.<\/p>\n

To read more stories from Colorado Public Radio, visit www.cpr.org<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

launches Voices for Awareness Foundation in Grand Junction<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16522,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[120,969,28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-29038","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado","tag-drug-trafficking","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29038","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29038"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29038\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29038"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=29038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}