JUAREZ, Mexico (Border Report) – It’s a synthetic opioid responsible for at least a quarter-million deaths in the United States since between 2021 and 2024.
It’s made with precursor chemicals from Asia and manufactured by the Sinaloa and Jalisco cartels in Mexico, whom the Drug Enforcement Administration blames for flooding U.S. streets with it.
Now fentanyl is killing people in Juarez, and local leaders are scrambling to keep a substance the drug cartels traditionally viewed as an export commodity from becoming a deadly problem in Mexico as well.
Alarms went off last Thursday after five young men – students, factory workers – gathered in south Juarez home to play video games and spice up the evening with drugs. “Regrettably, it was a mix of cocaine and fentanyl. Three of them died and two more were hospitalized,” said Chihuahua Deputy Attorney General Carlos Manuel Salas.
That happened just after midnight in the Oasis Revolucion neighborhood. Less than two hours later in the Salvacar district of southeast Juarez, two men ages 39 and 53 succumbed to a similar illicit drug mix.
Authorities suspect the same dealer provided drugs to the two groups of friends and blame him for the five fatalities.
“We are trying to locate the provider responsible for these deaths (with) adulterated drugs, with drugs that are pure poison and that ended the lives of these five young people,” Salas said. “It’s regrettable to have such inhumane people that, in addition to selling drugs, they mix it in a way that it is poison.”
It’s been five days since the incident. The suspect is not in custody, and professionals who rehabilitate drug addicts in this Mexican border city fear what happened last Thursday could become commonplace.
“We have seen very strong movement (of fentanyl) in the past three years,” said Miguel Angel Miranda, a psychologist at a Juarez rehab clinic called Vivir para Amar y Servir (Live to Love and Serve).
Miranda said Juarez is not prepared to cope with widespread consumption of fentanyl, which he said is cheaper than heroin. So-called prevention campaigns are not reaching young people, he said.
Suddenly, “we have situations that make us see the possible great fentanyl problem that we have in the city,” Miranda said. “It’s a very strong drug, a very addictive drug which is getting out of our control.”
Denial turns to a sense of urgency
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has seized more than 34 tons of fentanyl in the Southwestern border since 2022. Mexican officials barely last year acknowledged the potentially deadly drug was manufactured in Mexico at all.
Chihuahua state police Chief of Staff Luis Aguirre on Monday said local officials are in close communication with their U.S. counterparts to interdict fentanyl – whether it’s headed north across the border or somehow staying in Mexico.
He said state authorities have seized more than 263,000 pills in the past year and “dismantled” three fentanyl labs in Juarez and in the mountains of southern and western Chihuahua.
“It’s important to mention that we maintain a permanent prevention campaign to keep our young people from being exposed to these drugs and, above all, to combat the criminal (organizations) dedicated to retail drug sales,” Aguirre said. “We also are procuring the medical resources to prevent the loss of life due to the incursion of fentanyl.”
ProVideo contributed to this report.
