800 Arrested in DEA Crackdown on Online Sales of Fentanyl-Laced Drugs

Drug-enforcement agents seized 1.8 million fake pills laced with the synthetic opioid fentanyl and arrested more than 800 people across the U.S. in a two-month crackdown on online sales of the potentially deadly drugs, reports the Wall Street Journal. The fake tablets are being mass-produced by Mexican cartels using chemicals from China and are then sold on social media and e-commerce sites, officials said.

In addition to the pills, authorities seized what they said was enough powder fentanyl to make millions of deadly tablets as well as 158 weapons, meth and cocaine during an effort that began Aug. 3. The seizures add to the nearly 9.6 million counterfeit pills the DEA has confiscated so far this year, which is more than it did in the previous two years combined. The number of fake pills found to contain fentanyl rose nearly 430 percent since 2019. Law-enforcement officials criticized social-media companies for failing to do more to stop the online sale of a growing number of counterfeit pills that look similar to prescription painkillers but contain sometimes lethal amounts of fentanyl. Platforms like Facebook and Snap disputed that fact and defended their efforts to keep illegal drug sales off platforms.