![]() ![]() Missing at Wednesday’s news conference was Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon, whose position on the fentanyl problem reflects the other side of the debate. “We have been down this road before: We know that increased penalties for drug offenses do not save lives,” said Alex Bastian, special advisor to Gascon, in an email. In more than three decades of increased drug penalties against criminal defendants, he said, drugs have become more potent, cheaper and easier to access. “We need to learn from the failed strategies of the past, in order to find solutions for the future,” Bastian said. Riverside County District Attorney Mike Hestrin said that since 2016, the number of fentanyl-related deaths in his county skyrocketed by more than 800%. “Those numbers are similar to what we’re seeing across the region. “All of us on the stage today have resolved, in one way or another, to fight back against this scourge.” Our citizens are dying at an alarming rate because of fentanyl,” Hestrin said. Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said the number of confirmed fentanyl deaths in the county in 2021 is nearly 400 thus far, but he anticipates that number to increase to more than 500 when toxicology results in other suspected overdose cases come in. He said fentanyl overdoses in his county have become such a problem that he outfitted every one of his deputies with naloxone, or Narcan, an over-the-counter nasal spray that is used to revive unconscious people who have overdosed on drugs. “Multiple times a day we are responding to cases where someone is unconscious or under the influence of fentanyl, typically being poisoned because they thought they were getting something else.” “I can’t even venture to guess how many lives we’ve saved in the last year because we do this on a daily basis,” Bianco said. San Bernardino County could not immediately provide the number of fentanyl related deaths in the county in 20. In Orange County, fentanyl-related deaths increased 1,067% from 2016 through 2020 - from 37 to 432. ![]() Those figures grew by 18.5% in 2021, with 512 fentanyl-related deaths logged, and toxicology still pending on more than 400 other cases, according to sheriff’s spokeswoman Carrie Braun.Īnd in Los Angeles County, 1,117 fatal fentanyl overdoses were recorded in 2021, down 0.7% from 1,125 the previous year, according to the county’s Department of Public Health. ![]()
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