[HN Gopher] "We're shipping to the US" - inside China's syntheti...
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       "We're shipping to the US" - inside China's synthetic opioid
       networks
        
       Author : 737min
       Score  : 8 points
       Date   : 2021-12-18 20:12 UTC (2 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.npr.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.npr.org)
        
       | Flatcircle wrote:
       | This is one of the biggest stories of the last decade. The huge
       | surge in homeless people and tent cities in the major
       | metropolitans over the last few years will probably turn out to
       | be due to a drug epidemic happening right before our eyes.
        
       | qwertyuiop_ wrote:
       | Joe Brandon could work with the Chinese to stop it at the source.
       | If this happens in China they would shut it down instantly.
        
         | throw_this_one wrote:
         | Pretty tough. And your guy Trump did 0 as well.
        
         | bognition wrote:
         | Can we keep the political smears off hacker news please?
         | 
         | I'm all for hearing opposing points of view but name calling
         | has no place here.
        
           | 737min wrote:
           | Which part do you feel is overly political? I thought the
           | above technical description to be very interesting and
           | relevant.
        
       | aurizon wrote:
       | This deadly racket uses letters to send Fentanyl and more
       | dangerous drugs to dealers in the USA. Pure Fentanyl has a lethal
       | dose in the average male of 2 milligrams. This is a small
       | quantity. 1 gram will dissolve in 40 milliliters of water. The
       | drug sellers then wet paper with the solution, it takes a few
       | sheets. Then they dry it and laser print data sheets for anything
       | and you will have 1 gram spread evenly through the paper, might
       | be any data at all, the object is to make it pass inspection
       | after it is mailed as innocent data sheets. The USA buyer then
       | washes the paper repeatedly with water - using repeated small
       | amounts of distilled water. It might take 10-20 washes, one after
       | the other, and it is then dissolved in the water. Then they have
       | a solution they can evaporate to dryness, and they will recover
       | almost 1 gram as a powder. With a laser printer very little black
       | ink dissolves as particles, but if there are, it can be filtered
       | before they dry it. If they use unsized and non glossy paper, and
       | distilled water, the purity will remain and the final dry powder
       | will remain potent. They then sell it. Since milligram doses are
       | a nuisance, they often mix it with a powder - here is where the
       | fatalities occur. It is very hard to make a uniform finely mixed
       | powder. Drug companies have detailed procedures to mix fine
       | powders with safety and uniformity, so they avoid any lumps. A
       | lump can kill a person. Once they have their powder, perhaps they
       | now have 1000 grams with a gram mixed in it - each gram of powder
       | = 1/2 fatal dose. They then get a pill press and make 10,000
       | pills of 100 milligrams each = the same gram is now in pill form,
       | with 1/20th of a fatal dose in each one. If the mix was well done
       | and tightly pressed(the mixing powder will be chosen to make
       | pills that are strongly bound as pills) they have an item they
       | can sell, telling the buyer what is in each pill. All is well -
       | unless there were a few lumps in the initial separation = a few
       | dead buyers/customers/addicts etc. There are some Fentanyl
       | derivatives that are 15 times as toxic = smaller lumps can kill.
       | The first class mail path is the safest, but most time consuming
       | mail method. Expresspost is faster, but it is inspected more
       | closely. There are other bulk methods, as listed on the DEA
       | website here. I am a retired chemist and the only way to deal
       | with this on this side is rigorous inspection of the mails letter
       | by letter with testers (which can be trained rats or other
       | animals that can detect any drug odor - if at all possible).
       | China clearly does not have the will to rigorously deal with this
       | problem, but they do have the power - if they are persuaded it is
       | in their best interest?
       | 
       | https://www.dea.gov/galleries/drug-images/fentanyl
       | 
       | There is more data in that website, poke around to see the
       | dimensions of this threat.
        
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       (page generated 2021-12-18 23:02 UTC)