US imposes sanctions on Chinese, Mexican entities in fentanyl action as crisis deepens

The United States sanctioned 17 people and entities in China and Mexico on Tuesday for facilitating the creation of counterfeit, fentanyl-laced pills, as the Biden administration works to reduce imports of the lethal substance.

The USTreasury Department, in a statement, said it slapped sanctions on seven entities and six people based in China, as well as one business and three people based in Mexico, as reported by Reuters.

It accused individuals of selling pill press machines and other equipment used to impress counterfeit trade markings onto illegally made tablets, which were frequently laced with fentanyl and bound for the United States.

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“Treasury’s sanctions target every stage of the deadly supply chain fueling the surge in fentanyl poisonings and deaths across the country,” the Treasury’s Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, Brian Nelson, said in the statement.

“Counterfeit pills laced with fentanyl constitute a leading cause of these deaths, devastating thousands of American families each year. We remain committed to using all authorities against enablers of illicit drug production to disrupt this deadly global production and counter the threat posed by these drugs," he added.

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According to research releasedearlier this month by the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the rate of drug overdose deaths containing the synthetic opioid fentanyl more than quadrupled in the United States between 2016 and 2021.

Fentanyl is up to 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine, and it is increasingly being combined with other illegal substances, frequently with disastrous effects.

According to government estimates, the number of drug-related overdose deaths in the United States will exceed 100,000 by 2021, prompting the Biden administration to call for action.

Fentanyl deaths on the rise

Based on data provided by the consulting firm California Health Policy Strategies, drug overdoses now kill two to three times as many people in the region as car crashes. Synthetic opioid-related fatalities have surged by 1,027 per centsince 2017.

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National Centre for Health Statistics (NCHS), which collects data on drug-related deaths under the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), says thattotal drug overdose deaths increased from 2019 to 2021. As perNCHS data, over 160,000 persons in the United States died from a drug-related overdose in 2021 alone.

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