Pills laced with fentanyl are spreading through Southeast Alaska, and Wrangell authorities are doing what they can to address the health hazard and danger.
“The buzzword right now is fentanyl,” said Police Chief Tom Radke. “The quantity that they’re recovering is exceeding what people thought was out there.”
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid 50 to 100 times stronger than morphine, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. The Alaska Department of Health reports fentanyl was responsible for almost 75% of opioid-related deaths in the state in 2021, whether on its own or cut with other substances.
It was originally developed as a pain management skin patch for cancer patients, but its potency and relatively cheap production cost have made it common on the illicit drug market.
Radke does not have positive evidence that the drug has made it to Wrangell, but he is “going with the assumption that there is some fentanyl on the island,” he said. “It would be naïve to say it’s not here.”
There were two likely overdoses in Skagway in January and two Sitkans have been charged with intent to distribute.
Like COVID-19, fentanyl has taken longer to spread to Wrangell than to communities in the Lower 48. Now that it’s on the rise in Southeast, it could present serious challenges, Radke said in a Feb. 22 interview. “We’re kind of isolated,” he said. “We’re just hoping it doesn’t get here to hurt somebody permanently.”
As a member of the Southeast Alaska Cities Against Drugs task force (SEACAD), the Wrangell Police Department is collaborating with other departments throughout the region to share information, training and resources.
Though the drug can appear in a wide variety of forms, it has been showing up frequently in blue counterfeit Oxycodone and Oxycontin pills, with the letter M on one side and the number 30 on the other, Lt. Krag Campbell of the Juneau Police Department told Petersburg radio station KFSK.
“Oxycodone and Oxycontin used to be a widely abused drug in the United States,” he said. “At some point over the past six, eight years … it’s much harder to obtain. So drug cartels are now making counterfeit versions of this pill, because that’s the pill that people liked.”
Law enforcement personnel reported last Friday that they had arrested two arriving passengers at the Juneau airport late Thursday evening, traveling from Seattle with approximately 5,000 counterfeit Oxycodone pills believed to contact fentanyl. The seized narcotics have an estimated street value of approximately $150,000, police said. The two Juneau residents were held on felony charges.
Traffickers also mix fentanyl with other drugs to drive addiction and attract repeat buyers, explained DEA Administrator Anne Milgram in a prepared statement. Overdose victims often do not know that they are taking fentanyl. A single counterfeit pill can be fatal in some cases.
Alaska police departments’ doses of Narcan — a brand name for naloxone, a medication that reverses or reduces the effects of opioids — doubled in strength starting December 2022 to keep up with the potency of illicit fentanyl. In Anchorage, the previous 4-milligram Narcan dose was only effective at reviving people on its own in three of 10 cases.
Petersburg-based state public health nurse Erin Michael distributes Narcan to Wrangell. Doses are available at the Wrangell Medical Center, at SEARHC Behavioral Health and through Wrangell Community Navigator Tammi Meissner, X’atshaawditee. Recipients must be 18 years old or older and complete a brief training to receive a free kit. “It involves being able to recognize what the signs of an overdose might look like, how to administer the vaccine and what to do after administering the vaccine,” said Michael.
Michael will visit Wrangell in April to attend the community health fair, where she will distribute Narcan kits and offer Narcan training to community members. The kits contain medication, informational resources and tests that can be used to determine whether a drug is laced with fentanyl.
She’ll also bring specialized containers for disposing of medical waste, which prevent unused drugs from entering the water table or being abused.
“Training on Narcan is important for every community,” she said. “Opioids and fentanyl abuse are present almost everywhere, which is a very sad reality. Being trained on how to respond if someone overdoses could potentially save somebody’s life.”
Narcan training is becoming as widespread and essential as CPR training, she added. Administering the medication is common protocol for first responders, “if somebody has gone down and they don’t know why they’re unconscious.”
“When in doubt, give them Narcan,” she said. “It’s not going to harm them, but it could help them.” She also urges people to call 911 in addition to administering the vaccine.
Alaska’s Good Samaritan law, which passed in 2014, protects people from civil lawsuits when they provide emergency aid in situations where the person needs immediate help “to avoid serious harm or death.”
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