Dope Overdose

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Fentinel was invented by Paul janson, one of the great scientific minds of the twentieth century. The drug is so potent nowadays that you don't have to shoot it up - you can smoke it. It's a magnificent drug for surgery, because it very quickly enters the brain. Unlike morphine, even heroine, which takes us a good deal longer, fentinel very quickly entering the brain. But it also a, it's easy toiits its its effects are short. So for surgery, that's perfect. You don't you you can bring somebody into anaesthesia very quickly, a do the operation and take them out with almost no effect. And so it really transformed surgery

Author and journalist Sam Quinones talks about his book, The Least of Us, with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Quinones focuses on the devastation caused by methamphetamine and fentanyl, the latest evolution of innovation in the supply of mind-altering drugs in the United States. The latest versions of meth, he argues, are more emotionally damaging than before and have played a central role in the expansion of the homeless in tent encampments in American cities. The conversation includes an exploration of the rising number of overdose deaths in the United States and what role community and other institutions might play in reducing the death toll.