China's Role in Fueling the Fentanyl Crisis
Mexican police bust multiple cartel members (Photo: Wikimedia Commons).
Evidence has surfaced pointing to a possible link between Mexican and Chinese drug cartels for the manufacturing and trafficking of fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid that is driving an increase in overdose deaths throughout the globe. The network of the international drug trade and its effects on public health are shown by this partnership. The opioid fentanyl, which is 50 times more powerful than heroin, is largely to blame for the opioid crisis and takes thousands of lives every year.
A relationship between Mexican drug gangs, who are well-known for smuggling drugs into the United States, and China, the country that produces the majority of the main ingredient for fentanyl, has been uncovered by recent investigations. The chemicals that you need to produce fentanyl are mostly supplied by China, which is often accused of having weak regulatory monitoring over pharmaceutical production. A common threat to public health and security, the clandestine transfer of these main ingredients to Mexican cartels has aggravated the already major opioid crisis.
Map of Mexican cartel territories, 6 in total (Photo: Flickr).
It is hard for law enforcement to track down the source of these chemicals because of the complex network of hidden channels and middlemen involved in this illegal cooperation. Chinese companies take advantage of legal gaps and laid back regulations to covertly supply precursor chemicals to Mexican cartels. They often operate in the shadows. Experts think that fentanyl coming into the US and other countries is often linked to this partnership. The huge amount of illegal chemicals that are trafficked throughout many countries emphasizes how quickly international cooperation is crucial to stopping this trade.
The Chinese government has been under the spotlight apparently for not being careful enough to control the precursor chemical production and export. Stricter laws and more collaboration with foreign law enforcement organizations, according to critics, are necessary to stop the trafficking of these lethal drugs. The Chinese government is trying to take action against this problem to respond to the growing demand. Even though it is still early to tell if those restrictions will actually work, it's a good step in the right direction. The cartels in Mexico and China work together on more than just the possession of chemicals. It may be more difficult to shut down these activities if intelligence reports indicate that Chinese criminal networks are also involved in the trafficking of completed fentanyl products.
Police in Mexico are shown making an arrest of drug traffickers (Photo: Wikimedia Commons).
Given the country's struggles with increasing levels of crime and the destabilizing effect of powerful drug gangs, Mexico will be greatly impacted by this alliance. The cartels' control over the drug trade has become stronger as a result of the introduction of Chinese-made fentanyl into their supply chains, which has also increased gang activity in the area. The United States, China, and Mexico's cooperation must be given top priority in international efforts to address this situation. The criminal networks that produce and distribute fentanyl need to be stopped.
To stop more deaths from occurring, the world has to understand how necessary it is to deal with this problem. Working together and taking action is essential to break the alliance between Chinese and Mexican cartels that is causing the fentanyl pandemic, as governments struggle with the difficult task of policing the pharmaceutical business. The world’s only hope for destroying the organizations fueling this disaster and freeing countless lives from this lethal synthetic opioid is to present a united front.
This is the synthetic opiod fentynal (Photo: Flickr).