The primary goal of "Fake is Real" is to educate people, and the younger the better.
Money will be spent to upgrade recovery centers, expand veteran outreach services, conduct substance abuse prevention programs aimed at student athletes and train certified recovery specialists at local colleges. The county will also acquire a mobile outreach vehicle called Hope1. It will travel the four corners of the county to provide drug and alcohol assessments and mental health referrals. It also has a billboard on Route 22.
Fentanyl kills, especially when it masquerades as something else. In Northampton County, over 6,000 people suffer from a drug disorder. In Lehigh County, it's 6,700. They are especially at risk. Statewide, over 89,000 doses of Naloxone have been administered since 2018.
On the one-year anniversary of the launch of Fake is Real campaign (Jan. 31), the county will host a 1:30 pm news conference and progress report st the county's Human Services Building at 2801 Emrick Blvd. Participants will include Executive Lamont McClure and District Attorney Steve Baratta.
According to Governing, fentanyl and the larger opioid crisis is one of the top issues being faced by state and local government. Drug overdoes deaths have doubled since the pandemic. I personally am acquainted with several people who lost children to this scourge.
One approach has been to crack down on dealers and even those who possess a small amount of fentanyl. But that approach has flaws. Even if the import of fentanyl is completed halted from Mexico and China, there still is a lot of domestic production. There are also new synthetics like nitazene, which is 40 times more powerful than fentanyl.
Pennsylvania recently enacted a law that requires acute care hospitals to test for both fentanyl and xylazine when conducting a drug screening.
We will never get to SUBSTANTIAL success in limiting this and other illegal, potentially more fatal, substances without far better control of our borders. Millions of unverified adults walking across our borders (unvetted and untraceable) will most definitely include a massive increase of new bad actors we could do without. Drug cartels have established footholds throughout America already.
ReplyDeleteIf we stopped 100% of the flow from China and Mexico, it can still be manufactured here domestically.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. It is up to the individual to want to either get help or to stay away from drugs completely. Obviously it is more easy to say than do.
DeleteHey Bernie why don’t you talk about the real problem with this country, gun violence. It kills 110 lives daily in this country and we have the worlds highest percent of gun ownership at 46% of private guns in the world. Should insurance be mandatory for each gun a person owns as a way to curb the dangers of our society?
ReplyDelete60% of gun deaths in this country are suicides. Of the remaining 40%, most gun related deaths are occurring in our 100 largest cities, and are related to gang and drug violence.
DeleteHeart disease and diabetes are killing substantially more Americans than Americans with guns who haven’t killed themselves and don’t belong to inner city gangs selling smack.
But ramble on.
Tax red meat, pasta, and candy bars if you want to save lives.
Thank the heavens for the great and powerful former resident of Northampton County Terrance Houck!!!!
ReplyDeletetRump's whitehouse pharmacy has it for sale and many other very very strong drugs, ask for Ronny. Bizarre how a packet of cocaine somehow belonged to Hunter when the whitehouse was an open door on drugs!
ReplyDeleteIf we hermetically sealed the border, enough fentanyl to kill thousands can still be transported in a mobile phone case. All of this is happening amid strict prohibitions and hundreds of millions spent on enforcement. Those efforts have failed because so many hate their lives and want to escape. At the same time, fewer and fewer believe in any higher power and their own powerlessness. That's a bad combination that addicts know well. I don't know how to solve that. We're recovering from shuttering churches and synagogues, and frightening people from going to recovery meetings and getting early detection screenings. I think it's going to be a long way back, if we can ever get back.
ReplyDeleteYes, yes, EVERYTHING is about the Mexican border, right? For chrissakes, get a clue.
ReplyDeleteI would like to see the old your brain on drugs commercials return because that really had an impact on me when I was growing up. Unfortunately, drugs will always be a big problem because kids idolize thugs (so many think Tupac is a martyr). Heck, the gang-banger druggie hangs out with Martha Stewart and has a prized spot hosting the Paris Olympics. When I was young, our parents made sure we didn’t associate with people who had questionable behavior, but I am afraid those days are gone. Drugs will always be with us, but educating about the evils must happen. Kudos to DA Houck for taking on this cause. Too bad he isn’t at the helm because I think he really knew how to make a difference in this area. Baratta is too busy giving interviews and whining about his understaffed office to tackle big stuff. (And Stevie, why did so many flee the office after your election? Got a mirror?)
ReplyDeleteIt is mostly manufactured right here in the good old USA
ReplyDeleteI’m the 4:36 pm dope. Forgot to write Snoop Dogg in reference to the gang banger druggie.
ReplyDeleteAt least McClure got another press conference out of it.
ReplyDelete4:07 - no, not everything is about the Mexican border. But, the mishandled Mexican border is creating a serious impediment to any progress in fixing this problem. Our careless attitude about security there has introduced millions of new people into the equation. These are people with a propensity for using and trafficking illegal drugs. With so little accountability and control at our Mexican border we are overwhelming our systems of managing this crisis. These are unvetted persons, many without legal, health, school and familial records. They are being quickly released throughout this nation. Some given a follow-up request to re-appear in court as long as 8 years later. Until then . . . . YOU figure it out.
ReplyDeleteFentanyl is the latest horrible scare in the news for which the solution always seems to be more government enforcement as the solution. Every time I hear about a drug bust in the news I think "waste of my tax dollars". Money poured into prohibition has only strengthened the drug cartels in and out of the country and produces gang violence in our cities. The reasoning that we need to go after the suppliers of self abusing substances hadn't worked when our country had an alcohol prohibition and does not work now. Remember, the return of the legalization of alcohol was a huge blow to organized crime. No one is out selling a bottle of beer out on a corner for $100.
ReplyDeleteThe erosion of our rights such as seizure of property and "no-knock" raid" home invasions which may cause an innocent's death has always been justified for the "war" we are in.
If the "war" actually produced positive results instead of increasing the motivation to push banned substances at incredible profits it would make sense, but it has proven not to for many years now. There is a reason we have the largest percentage of our populace in prison in the world.
It has been shown that spending one dollar on public information and rehabilitation is more effective for communities than two dollars spent on prohibition and incarceration. Continuing the current path will only support the cartels, gangs, prison unions and erosion of our rights.
Fentanyl is here and no matter what we do, it will remain. Once the network, distribution, and user base is set up, it becomes a permanent scourge on society. Seal the border? Go ahead. It won't stop the flow nor the domestic manufacture.
ReplyDeleteOne issue I see is the attitude toward 'hard drugs' is shifting. Municipalities cater to those people by having safe injection sites and offering free needles. Others are considering relaxing the laws on more illicit drugs. This fuels the problem and we cannot expect a solution if some (so-called) leaders cater to the users. Elected Dimwit: "[Drug name] is an epidemic but if you want free needles and a safe space, we gotcha covered."
Anonymous 12:07:
ReplyDeleteO.D. deaths in the US 2022: 110,000
Gun deaths in the US 2022: 48,117. 56% were suicides.
Automobile deaths in the US in 2022: 42,795.
Deaths due to medical errors in the US: estimated 250,000 per year.
So apparently the drug cartels don’t even exist, according to commentators here. There is no fentanyl coming across the border. There isn’t 10s of thousands of missing citizens in Mexico who authorities believe have been killed by the cartels. The cartels are actually sombrero manufacturers who are trying to beat the tariffs, so they sneak them across. If you can’t admit that the president purposely destroyed the southern border, causing an explosion of Chinese made and drug cartel delivered fentanyl to flood our streets to the point where the put it in other street drugs to kill more of our youth, say nothing!
ReplyDeleteDo none of you know that Duragesic, a transdermal patch for pain contains fentanyl? Maybe why it can be legally manufactured in US? Sheesh! Guess not. Close the border, Joe, before more people die but don’t blame legal manufacturing, folks.
ReplyDelete