Fentanyl, Inc.: How Rogue Chemists Are Creating the Deadliest Wave of the Opioid Epidemic
by Ben Westhoff
View on GoodreadsBen Westhoff's investigative journalism on the fentanyl supply chain — Chinese chemists synthesizing analogues, dark-web distribution, Mexican cartel finishing operations — as the third and most lethal phase of the opioid crisis.
Core ideas
- The chemistry is the structural advantage: fentanyl analogues can be designed faster than they can be scheduled, so legal pursuit is always one molecule behind the supply.
- The shift from prescription opioids to heroin to fentanyl was driven partly by the supply-side success of the early-2010s pill-mill crackdowns — closing the legal supply opened the illegal one, with a much-higher-lethality result.
- The Chinese precursor industry is treated as a state-permission-or-blind-eye phenomenon — the book makes the case that the chemistry is too sophisticated and the volumes too large for the operations to be invisible to Chinese regulators.
Published2019
Pages356
ISBN9780802127433
ReadDec 2024
