How often were you doing fentanyl?
At first it was maybe for the first few days,
maybe once or twice a day, and then
after those few days every 30 minutes.
How much money were you spending on it?
A little over $1000 a week from
affluent neighborhoods in Carlsbad
to homeless encampments in Santee.
It's scary. It's it's really scary.
I found someone one of my friends
just dead in this time. And it?
That's a lot. It's fentanyl
continues to invade the lives
of San Diego in record numbers
and for people who've never taken this drug.
You know, we hear about how
strong it is, how powerful it is,
the kind of high it gives people.
Tell me what it feels like. Oof.
It's like a warm blanket.
A security blanket.
Something that makes you feel safe,
or you know when you're really cold
and you walk out into the sun,
and that first ray of
sunshine that just hits you.
That's what it feels like.
According to San Diego County,
over the last three years,
the number of fentanyl overdose deaths
has exploded from 151 in 2019 to 462
in 2020 and close to 800 and 2021,
with potentially more cases pending.
DEA special agent in charge. Shelly, how,
why do these deaths keep happening?
Well, I think the demand is there.
It's a cheap high and fentanyl,
you know. Is the trend?
The purity we're seeing is increasing,
which is another extremely scary fact.
The county's new approaches to
saturate the streets with naloxone,
also known as Narcan,
a drug that reverses an overdose.
It's giving it to anyone
who wants it for free.
Hey.
Good good. How are you good good you
brought you some supplies? CBS 8 cameras
went along with one of the
county's homeless outreach teams.
After you guys use it,
you're going to need to call.
Medical ambulance OK,
yes, as they distributed
it near Mast Park, it's better
to have it and not need it than
to need it and not have it.
And without it I mean people
are dying as it does feel
like we're literally saving lives with
it and someone who knows that first hand.
I went from one drink to 5 drinks to 10
drinks to cocaine to mess to fentanyl.
24 year old Aaron Elliott
graduated from Carlsbad.
Hi mom, Peggy and Dad Kevin,
say even though her life may have
looked perfect on the outside.
Their daughter struggled with mental
health issues as a teenager and
eventually became hooked on drugs.
It was brutal,
very hard. Very very hard.
The phone calls the not coming home.
The phone calls at three in the morning.
Come get me. It's a lot of
physical and emotional stress
they didn't know Aaron was addicted
to fentanyl or that back in September.
She overdosed and almost died.
The next thing I remember is coming to
the bunch of EMT standing around me.
And my friend crying in the corner
screaming like you were dead,
you were dead. You were blue.
My heart stopped. I had no pulse.
I didn't have any respirations and
this went on for about 10 minutes.
She says it took three rounds of
naloxone to bring her back to life. When
you think about that day,
had the Narcan not been there?
When you think about
what could have happened?
What goes through your mind?
I would have been another
statistic and I would be another.
Post on somebody's Facebook wall. She
now teaches others how to use
in a lock zone by working with
the nonprofit in new Path.
She says the county's
approach is the right one.
The county just started giving
out in a lock zone at each of
its six public health centers,
including this one right here in El Cahone.
All you have to do is show up.
They'll give you one of these
kits and you can take it home.
Anybody can administer it.
Anybody can actually get access
to this medication and it's really
as simple as somebody coming in.
And saying, can I have a kit, please?
Right now the county has a stash of
nearly 4000 doses in new Laaksonen.
There are plans to get a lot
more according to county leaders.
The medication is provided
by the state for free and
the reality is the war on
drugs has been abysmal.
Failure this notion that you're
just going to enforce an arrest
your way through dealing with
the reality of addiction.
Chair Nathan Fletcher.
What we're doing with naloxone
is simply trying to save
lives of people who overdose
experts, estimate about
33,000 doses of naloxone.
Will need to be distributed each year
locally to get this crisis under control.
Another tool that's up for consideration.
Fentanyl strips so users can test
their drugs for fentanyl before using.
What would your response be?
Though to critics who may say
we're just enabling people to
continue to use drugs? Yeah,
but I mean the same would be true
if you had a diabetic who didn't
monitor their insulin level properly
and they went into diabetic shock.
And we said, well, we're just going
to let you die because you should
have better monitored your insulin.
We don't do that.
We don't turn away someone from
the emergency room because they
didn't take care of their health
and they were overweight and say,
well, you made a bad choice.
We're not going to treat
your heart condition,
though. The use of pure fentanyl
is becoming more popular.
The DEA says many of the overdose
deaths are happening to people who
have no idea they're even taking it.
Users often think they're taking
a drug like oxycodone or cocaine.
Instead, it's laced with fentanyl. This is
1 pill can kill. You get one
shot at this and it's over.
Sadly, teenagers are among those
who fall victim last May of 15 year
old Coronado High School student
died of a fentanyl overdose.
Do you think that naloxone
should be available in schools? I
think Knox and should
be available everywhere.
CBS ain't checked with local school
districts to find out if they
have naloxone on hand at their
schools in case of an overdose.
These were the only districts on
this list who responded. Yes, you
guys did launch a public awareness campaign.
The one pill. Can kill campaign.
And yet this still keeps happening.
Why isn't the public getting the message?
I think it's education we have to
continue to educate the people here.
These are things that we have
to make the parents aware of
and that includes, she says,
the fact that you can buy drugs
on social media platforms like
Instagram and Tick Tock using emojis
as your kid sits next to you on the
couch and they're ordering something
with emojis and you earned on the wiser.
The DEA posted a chart online
showing what each of the emoji
stands for when it comes to drugs.
Special agent in Charge House says,
though they've seized enough fentanyl for.
Every American to have a lethal dose.
The drugs continue flowing
into the US from Mexico.
You put your finger in the dam to
try to stop the water coming in,
and it's overflowing on top of you.
It's defeating, yes,
but it's not going to make us quit.
It makes us work harder.
Experts say there are myths
that fentanyl users are seeking
a high every time they use,
but Doctor Luke Bergman says some
users are using it just to function.
They're seeking it out just to stay
well because of this sort of cycle.
Of tolerance and withdrawal that
we see with with opioid use.
He acknowledges the healthcare industry
bears some responsibility for this crisis.
Users sometimes turn to illicit
drugs because they can't get
prescriptions from their doctor.
He says the idea naloxone will
just give users the green
light to keep using is false,
so there's actually
really good research that
demonstrates that communities that
lean into distributing naloxone
are not increasing drug use, and.
I understand, of course,
that that's a kind of common
misconception about naloxone
distribution and about harm
reduction approaches generally
that they're facilitating drug
use that more people will engage
in drug use in the context where
harm reduction work is happening.
It's actually not true,
Aaron says. The grip fentanyl had on
her was so powerful that just hours
after she nearly died, taking the drug,
she still thought about using. And this is
how sickening this drug is.
She's been sober now four months.
Do you think you'll ever go back to it?
I can't say yes and I can't say no.
I want to say no. I'll never,
never, never go back to that,
but when I had three years clean,
I said I will never use fentanyl and I did.
It's really not until they're ready. You
can want it for them all you want,
but it's not till they hit
rock bottom today.
I live in a just for today mindset.
Just for today I will not pick up.
Just for today. I will not drink.
Just for today I will not use drugs and
if I can do that every single day for
as long as I live. Then I should be OK.
In Carlsbad Kelly Hospital CBS 8.