🌊 Is This Only the Beginning?

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“One death is a tragedy…”

It’s hard to fathom the scale of the United States’ fentanyl crisis: In 2023, more Americans died from fentanyl overdoses than in the Iraq, Afghanistan, and Vietnam Wars – combined.

In the same year, more Americans died from fentanyl overdoses than from car crashes, gun homicides, drowning, and choking – combined.

And in 2023 alone, more Americans died from fentanyl than could fill the Kansas City Chiefs’ Arrowhead Stadium for a playoff game.

Yet to quote Joseph Stalin: “One death is a tragedy, a million deaths a statistic.”

So here’s a story…

Three days before Christmas, an acquaintance of ours in New York City went out with his friends, who were doing cocaine. Everyone was fine, and two of the group bought more cocaine and went out again the next night.

This time, the drugs were laced with fentanyl. One died; another overdosed but survived.

These guys weren’t alone: Accidental fentanyl overdose victims include Tom Petty, Prince, Mac Miller, and tens of thousands of less famous Americans. Hundreds of thousands more knew they were taking fentanyl – which is 50x as potent as heroin – but took too much, stopped breathing, and died.

Given the scale of this tragedy, you would think the media would be all over the story. But they’re not: In fact, in the last month, The New York Times published more articles mentioning “book bans,” “student loans,” and “gender identity” than “fentanyl.”

We wanted to fill that void, especially after recent trips to drug-ravaged neighborhoods in Philadelphia and Portland left us with countless questions: Who invented fentanyl? Why is it a uniquely American problem? Why do drug dealers cut their products with it? Is China intentionally sending it to the US? Who in the US is profiting off of this?

To answer these questions, we spoke with Ben Westhoff, one of the best-positioned people in the world to speak on the topic.

In the early 2010s, Westhoff was an investigative reporter covering LA’s culture scene. In doing so, he noticed frequent reports of people dying from ecstasy. Ecstasy is rarely fatal, so he began asking questions – and soon realized that people weren’t dying of ecstasy but of drugs laced with a new synthetic opioid called “fentanyl.”

Westhoff had stumbled on the tip of an iceberg: At that point, around 2,000 Americans were dying of fentanyl annually. Today, many Americans are dying every two weeks, likely making it the deadliest time in history to be a drug user.

Westhoff dove into this question to understand where fentanyl came from, how its takeover happened, and who is responsible. That research led him undercover to a fentanyl-ingredient processor in China, as well as into the underbelly of America’s fentanyl market, where he interviewed drug dealers and fentanyl producers.

Westhoff’s work produced Fentanyl, Inc.: How Rogue Chemists Are Creating the Deadliest Wave of the Opioid Epidemic, a terrific book.

Perhaps the most concerning part of this, though, is that a newer, deadlier wave of the opioid epidemic may be already underway. Westhoff talks about that and much more on our newest episode of We the 66.

If you would like to listen, here are the links: YouTube, Spotify, and Apple. Also, please subscribe to help us reach more people with investigations like this and attract bigger guests. We hope you learn something new.

P.S: Reader Replies

We received loads of feedback from you last week, so here’s a sample:  

Regarding censorship

Mason wrote, “I just listened to the first two episodes of your podcast and I want to say that I’m so relieved to hear people talking so explicitly about the censorship going on. I felt it so intensely in college. Other students harassed me for being a Zionist, even after I wrote an article clearly calling for coexistence. I was one of very few people on campus who felt comfortable talking about Israel unless their view was staunchly anti-Zionist.

“As with most social issues, students could not ask too many questions or have real conversations about it. Which is a shame because I really like hearing opinions I disagree with. That’s why I’m so excited to listen to the rest of the episodes, there’s so many varying viewpoints. Also, the good news and the things Big News doesn’t want me to know.

“I really appreciate what you guys are doing.”

Regarding the fact that no graves were found at Kamloops

Rob wrote, “This is shameful reporting guys. Didn't take long for you to slip into the same old groove as other networks. The sites were never confirmed they were always anomalies. They are not digging up the sites for confirmation. Shameful to use the words Hoax as residential schools were a terrible thing and children were abused and did die. You don't have the weight for them to want to talk to you so throwing that in there is awful too. I had such high hopes.”

Sana wrote, “I think you believe you are doing a service by giving a voice to stories like the below. But without context, you are diminishing the actual hardships and colonialist oppression indigenous peoples have endured. I’ll be unsubscribing”

Elias wrote, “I think your Canada episode was your best and most important yet. People don’t want to hear information that challenges their views. I appreciate you sharing it.”

Thank you for reading, listening, and sharing your thoughts.

–Max F and Max T

RocaNews Co-founders

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