Amid its regular tradition of recognizing people and events with community impact, achievement and otherwise, the city of Santa Clarita acknowledged Tuesday a national day it certainly wished wasn’t necessary: a second annual National Fentanyl Awareness and Prevention Day.
During the Santa Clarita City Council’s first meeting back from summer recess, council members took time to recognize the terrible toll the dangerous drug — which is reportedly 100 times more potent than heroin and 50 times more potent than morphine — has taken on the community.
“There are now 31 families in our community who are without their loved ones, all due to fentanyl poisoning,” City Councilwoman Laurene Weste said Tuesday during the recognition. “As a city, we must work together to help combat this alarming number, by collaborating with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and local school districts to educate our residents.”
Weste also invited the community to attend a forum the city is hosting on fentanyl Sept. 28 at the Canyon Country Community Center.
The deaths are referred to as poisonings as opposed to overdoses because those who consume the fatal doses are often unaware that the drugs they are taking are laced with fentanyl.
The Drug Enforcement Administration on Monday declared Aug. 21 as National Fentanyl Prevention and Awareness Day in light of the rise of deaths the nation has seen in recent years, which one local expert likened to “the biggest epidemic we’ve ever faced.”
Cary Quashen, president and founder of Action Drug Rehab and a voice in local addiction issues, was glad to see the city was joining the national effort to recognize the deadly drug
“We’ve finally got it where everyone’s talking about it right now — which is great, because the more information we get out there, the more lives we can save,” Quashen said Tuesday shortly before the recognition, “because knowledge is power.”
“We’re losing more people right now to accidental deaths, to overdose deaths, than we ever had in history,” added Quashen, who also participated in a town hall on fentanyl earlier in the year hosted by The Signal.
Matt Markley talked about the loss of his child, Jax Markley, who died from fentanyl poisoning in November, sharing an emotional story and urging the children who filled Council Chambers for a subsequent club soccer program recognition to realize that their “lives are precious.”
The local and national numbers reflect the trend, as did the sentiment from the DEA that explained the reason for the recognition in a statement on the agency’s website.
“Fentanyl is the single deadliest drug threat our nation has ever encountered. Fentanyl is everywhere. From large metropolitan areas to rural America, no community is safe from this poison,” wrote DEA Administrator Anne Milgram. “We must take every opportunity to spread the word to prevent fentanyl-related overdose death and poisonings from claiming scores of American lives every day.”
The numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicate the problem is trending in the wrong direction despite billions spent to date on prevention efforts.
“In 2021, 106,699 drug overdose deaths occurred in the United States,” according to the CDC website. “The age-adjusted rate of overdose deaths increased by 14% from 2020 (28.3 per 100,000) to 2021 (32.4 per 100,000).”
Federal officials announced the first prosecutions resulting from local and federal task forces working to eradicate the drug in May.
