The Streets of San Francisco
In many ways, the Fentanyl crisis is America’s perfect storm of a bad story. Pharmaceutical companies pushed opioids even though there were clear signs they were highly addictive. While hospital workers had overdosed on the much stronger Fentanyl (which was originally reserved for use during surgery), that drug was released into the market as well. For years, the DEA let pill mills and quack doctors hand out these painkillers like Tic Tacs. Finally, the pill mills were shut down. But people were already addicted. El Chapo and his ilk, knowing that marijuana legalization would remove that crop from the profit ledger, decided to feed the addicted with illegal, stronger Fentanyl. Similar drugs began arriving from China. Suddenly, every pill popped to feed an addiction could be the last thing a person ever swallowed. And like everything else aside from the stock market gains of those at the top, the pandemic made matters worse. The San Francisco Chronicle’s Heather Knight picks up the story through the eyes of one mom trying to save a daughter after already losing a son to America’s horrific scourge. She set out to save her daughter from fentanyl. She had no idea what she would face on the streets of San Francisco. Sadly, those streets run all the way across the country.