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Episode Ten: The Illicit Fentanyl Crisis
478 Plays10 months ago
The opioid epidemic and fentanyl crisis are killing our children. According to the NY Times, opioids are the leading cause of child poisoning deaths.
Research from Yale University recently found that in 2021, fentanyl was responsible for 94% of pediatric opioid deaths. Why aren't more people talking about this?
Brian Townsend, former Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent and founder and principal of Eagle 6 Training shares his mission to raise awareness on education and prevention.
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Transcript
Introduction and Disclaimer
00:00:04
Speaker
Hi everyone and welcome to the Guardians of Hope podcast where we bring together parents, nonprofits, legal and medical experts dedicated to positively impacting children's lives. Before we begin, this content should not be used as legal or medical advice. The purpose of this podcast is to inform and unite. So please seek advice from your attorney or doctor to address your specific needs.
00:00:29
Speaker
The thoughts and opinions of my guests are not necessarily my own. This is a platform for sharing.
Fentanyl Crisis in Children
00:00:36
Speaker
This episode is focused on fentanyl poisoning in children. So before we start, if this might trigger you or anyone who's listening around you, now is the time to turn this episode off.
00:00:50
Speaker
A recent study from Yale University examined the nation's fentanyl crisis among children. According to the study, in 1999, only 5% of opioid deaths in children were due to fentanyl. But in 2021, the drug was responsible for 94% of deaths. Pediatric deaths from fentanyl rose substantially in 2013, around the same time fentanyl deaths also trended upward for adults.
00:01:18
Speaker
Since 2013, pediatric deaths from fentanyl have risen 3,000%. The only thing worse about these stats is that these deaths are preventable.
Expert Insight: Brian Townsend
00:01:29
Speaker
Joining me to discuss this is Brian Townsend, former DEA agent. Brian is the founder and principal of Eagle Six Training, which provides speaking, training, and consulting services to both businesses and law enforcement entities around the world. Brian, thank you so much for joining me.
00:01:48
Speaker
Yeah, hi Cynthia. I'm happy to be here and look forward to this. Excellent. So you spent 23 years with the DEA. Can you tell me a little bit about your work at the agency and how you're currently using that knowledge to raise awareness about fentanyl poisoning? Yeah, I served 28 years in law enforcement, 23 with the DEA, the Drug Enforcement Administration.
00:02:12
Speaker
24 of my 28 years were in some type of enforcement capacity, so I know a lot about drug trafficking and how to work those investigations. I worked 10 years in Arkansas, about seven in South Texas, four in Quantico, Virginia, at our training academy, and then the last two years I was in Springfield, Missouri as a resident agent in charge, which means I oversaw all DEA operations in 25 counties in Southwest Missouri.
00:02:40
Speaker
So in 2022, I retired from the DEA and I opened my own business, Eagle Six Training. And I also work for the Midwest Organized Crime Information Center as a law enforcement training coordinator. And we serve law enforcement in nine states. So although I'm not wearing a badge, I still happily work with law enforcement every day. And I've started to build different curriculum, you know, based on my experience, 28 years, most of that time with DEA.
00:03:10
Speaker
And I developed a program for fentanyl. It's a four-hour program. It's very comprehensive. And it's really like anything else offered. It was originally designed for law enforcement and other first responders, but it really expanded pretty quickly to a lot of other audiences. School teachers, administrators, medical professionals, health advocates, treatment recovery folks.
00:03:35
Speaker
Most of my presentations are now open to the public, but those are my typical audiences. So the past 15 months, I've been to 11 different states, and I've given this presentation over 40 times. And it's been well received, and I think people are just eager for this information. It's very important, and I'm happy to spread the awareness. Thanks, Brian. So I wanted to ask, why fentanyl?
The Threat of Illicit Fentanyl
00:03:57
Speaker
Why is it so widespread?
00:04:00
Speaker
Well, quite simply, really, illicit fentanyl is just very addictive. I mean, that's the simplest answer I can give you. It's extremely addictive drug, and it creates customers for drug traffickers. The cartels are making record profits from this. They took advantage of our legal opioid crisis back in the 2012, 2013 time period to push heroin, and then they put fentanyl in the heroin supply, and it's just taken off. I mean, I call fentanyl a game changer.
00:04:31
Speaker
24 of my 28 years in law enforcement were in some type of enforcement capacity and never saw a drug more impactful. It's 50 times more powerful than heroin. It's a lot cheaper to make. It's fully synthetic, so you no longer need the plant. It's just all chemicals. These pills cost the cartels just pennies to make. They've just saturated the market and it's an extremely addictive drug.
00:04:58
Speaker
Tell me how children are exposed to fentanyl. Most commonly through pills, you know, oxy, Adderall's, Xanax, Percocet, I mean, you name it, fentanyl's found its way into our drug supply. It's everywhere, cocaine, meth, heroin, if you can find it, even marijuana, but that's pretty rare. Pills is the big way, especially for kids.
00:05:25
Speaker
If there's a counterfeit pill out there, there's a good chance it'll contain fentanyl. They can find it anywhere is what you're saying. A child can get ahold of it anywhere. Yeah, absolutely.
00:05:45
Speaker
It's all over our drug supply. Nothing's immune from fentanyl. It has found its way into everything. Like I said, most commonly the pills when it comes to children, but it's still cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin. Heroin is how it originally came into the drug supply. It was through the heroin and then from there it's gotten to everything.
00:06:13
Speaker
So, let's talk a bit about why kids are more at risk or susceptible. You know, the focus of this podcast is child advocacy. So, I might want to bring it home for everyone who's listening. Why are they more susceptible to poisoning or overdose? Sure. I think there's two reasons. You know, first is teenage years are typically when people experiment with drugs.
00:06:41
Speaker
And the second reason is they don't have the knowledge. They're not getting the information they need to make informed decisions.
00:06:49
Speaker
You know, only two milligrams of fentanyl is considered a lethal dose. I mean, two milligrams is maybe a few granules of salt or sand. And I don't know if you drink coffee or not, but your typical sugar packet is about a thousand, I'm sorry, about a gram. So grams, a thousand milligrams. So if two milligrams of fentanyl is a lethal dose, there would be 500 lethal doses in that one typical package of sugar, 500. And that's how little it takes to kill someone.
00:07:19
Speaker
And people just don't know that, especially our children. And like I said, the teenage years are critical for all types of experimentation. And statistically speaking, if people are going to experiment with drugs or alcohol, it's usually in their teenage years.
00:07:37
Speaker
That hasn't changed from any generation, but what has changed is that, like I said earlier, fentanyl is in our drug supply. Now we have a drug that only two milligrams is enough to kill you and it's made our way into everything. Kids are experimenting now with drugs and they're dying from first time drug use. I can't say it enough. It's a game changer. I've never seen a drug more impactful.
00:08:02
Speaker
And being that it's so potent and kids' bodies are much smaller than adults, right? That makes it a hundred times worse, I'm sure. Absolutely. I mean, they don't have the tolerance to it. Smaller bodies, yeah, absolutely. All those factors play into it and it's devastating children.
Naloxone: A Lifesaver
00:08:21
Speaker
Does Narcan or Narcan, am I saying that right, Brian? Yeah. Does that work in the instance? It does, it reverses. So what happens is when you take an opioid, it attaches itself to the opioid receptors and that's what blocks or reduces the intensity of pain. So Narcan
00:08:41
Speaker
kicks that opioid off its receptor, and it blocks the opioid from doing what it does. Because it doesn't take a lot of opioid, especially this illicit fentanyl, to kill you, to stop your breathing. I mean, your brain tells your heart, hey, I got this, and your heart slowly stops beating, and obviously you'll die. So Narcan, naloxone, is a medication that prevents that.
00:09:11
Speaker
I hate to use the word reverse, but that's kind of what it does. It stops the overdose and it prevents the opioid from doing the damage that it was intending to do. Got it. Thanks, Brian. My last question is focused on schools and parents.
Preventive Measures and Parental Role
00:09:26
Speaker
How can we work together to address this problem and make it more preventable?
00:09:33
Speaker
education and awareness programs work. And there's a lot of programs, there's a lot of people out there like myself who are providing accurate information to kids. And just giving them good information because they're gonna get information somewhere. Whether it's their friends, drug traffickers, social media, we gotta give them real information, accurate information. And we gotta let them know that there's risks and there's consequences for the things they do in life.
00:10:02
Speaker
The other thing, parents can reinforce this, these messages. Engage with your children. Have open discussions about drugs. You don't need to be a DEA agent to talk to kids. Be involved in their lives. Know who their friends are. Know who their influences are. Know if they're on social media. Know what kind of apps they're using. Just be engaged. Reinforce that positive message that, hey, only two milligrams of fentanyl is enough to kill you. Did you know that? And let's have that discussion.
00:10:30
Speaker
You know, be someone they can have hard conversations with.
Communicating with Children about Fentanyl
00:10:34
Speaker
This is great advice. And what about the little ones? You know, when you and I first chatted about this topic, I told you I have a young son. He's 10. But a couple years ago, I had to have a real conversation with him about this because it was coming into schools looking like candy, right? So how do we talk to little ones about this?
00:10:57
Speaker
It's the same conversation, but it's just a little bit more age appropriate. The words are vocabulary is going to be to a level that they're going to understand. At the end of the day, it's the same conversation. We're talking about how deadly this drug is. The example I gave you with the sugar packet.
00:11:20
Speaker
I think a young child, even though he or she may not drink coffee, that's something they can visualize. Here's a packet of sugar, and this one little package is enough to kill 500 people.
00:11:33
Speaker
No, just making it, again, having the conversation more age appropriate with the vocabulary and words that they can understand and allowing them to ask you questions and establishing that relationship where as they grow older and as they experience more of these negative influences in their life that they know who they can go to to get real, accurate information.
Conclusion and Resources
00:12:00
Speaker
Absolutely. Brian, thank you so much for your time and sharing your experience and knowledge around this topic. If anyone wants to learn more about Brian's mission to raise awareness and foster a deeper understanding of the opioid epidemic and illicit fentanyl crisis, visit his website, only2mg.com. Brian, thank you. Thank you very much. It's my pleasure. Appreciate it.