New synthetic drugs proving deadly

Not that many years ago, it wasn't that unusual to read on these pages stories about "meth labs" being broken up around our area.

Laws were passed to make it more difficult to obtain the cold medicine necessary to manufacture methamphetamine -- be prepared to spend extra time at the pharmacy counter and have your ID handy if you're looking for effective relief from sniffles and coughing of the common cold.

Mexican drug labs were more than happy to fill the void, however, the methamphetamine charges are as common as ever in our court news.

There are plenty of other drugs to fill the void as well, prescription opiates for one, and old-fashioned heroin for another.

But anyone who may be tempted to pop a couple of what look like legitimate oxycodone tablets could be in for a deadly surprise.

The Wall Street Journal recounted the story of a nice couple who were friendly with their neighbors but spent their time pressing the cheap, deadly opioid fentanyl into the shape of prescription oxycodone tablets.

The illegal drug-manufacturing pendulum seems to be swinging back to cottage industries made possible by cheap pill-pressing machines and foreign suppliers -- this time, the Chinese.

Drug dealers have been cutting fentanyl and it's powerful cousin, carfentanil, into heroin and other drugs to increase profits.

The Associated Press identified 12 Chinese businesses that said they would export carfentanil to the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Belgium and Australia for as little as $2,750 a kilogram (2.2 pounds), no questions asked.

Carfentanil is so powerful the U.S. government is concerned about its potential use as a chemical weapon. Despite U.S. protests, it is not a controlled substance in China where it is manufactured legally and sold openly online.

How dangerous is it?

Carfentanil is 100 times stronger than fentanyl, which is 50 times stronger than heroin.

An amount of carfentanil smaller than a poppy seed can kill a person.

It was developed in the 1970s and its only routine use is as an anesthetic for elephants and other large animals. Carfentanil and fentanyl are banned from the battlefield under the Chemical Weapons convention.

Russian special forces used an aerosol version of carfentanil in an attempt to free more than 800 hostages from a Moscow theater in 2002, held by Chechen separatists. It worked, after a fashion, but unfortunately killed more than 120 hostages.

A debate about the legalization of marijuana is raging around the country, especially in states like Nebraska that border states where it is legal, or in states where voters will decide, come November, whether to approve some sort of legalization.

There should be no debate, however, about the need to impose the strictest controls on the most lethal drugs now finding their way into our citizens' bodies.